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NAN IN THE CITY. 









* 



Nan Plays fok the P>oys. 






NAN IN THE CITY; 

OR, 

Ban’s caimter toiti) tfte ®irls. 


A SEQUEL TO 

NAN AT CAMP CHICOPEE. 


BY 



MYRA SAWYER HAMLIN. 


ILLUSTRATED BY L. J. BRIDGMAN. 




BOSTON: 






ROBERTS B ROTH ERS.j^i 
1897. 

C 



Copyright, 1897, 

By Myra Sawyer Hamlin 


// 


^Enibcrsitg ^rcss: 

John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U. S. A. 


CONTENTS 


Chapter Page 

I. Nan among New Friends 7 

II. In which Some Threads are tied ... 26 

III. Nan visits the College Settlement . . 48 

IV. A Light through Paul’s Window. — Gio- 

vanni DISTINGUISHES HiMSELF .... 72 

V. The End of the Fairy Tale 89 

VI. A Day at School and a Football Game 102 

VII. Nan tries to lift the Curtain of the 

Future 121 

VIII. The Chicopee Coach at the Great Game 145 

IX. Giovanni as the Princeton Mascot . . 159 

X. Mrs. Prince invites Guests to a Christ- 
mas Party 176 

XL Nan and Marshall discover a Romance 194 
XII. Camp Chicopee is to found a Colony . . 211 

XIII. Five Years later. — How Nan paid her 

Debt to Mrs. Prince 235 



1 . 







NAN IN THE CITY. 


CHAPTER I. 

NAN AMONG NEW FRIENDS. 

T A ! la ! Look out there, you girl with 
-L/ the clubs ! I’m coming ! ” 

Apart from the groups of girls who in the 
short loose dress of the gym ” waited the 
arrival of a new teacher in Physical Culture, 
a solitary young athlete performed with 
marvellous skill a rapid series of movements 
with Indian clubs. Above, perched as the 
cherub that sits aloft,” a tiny squirrel-like 
girl hung from a trapeze some fifteen feet in 
the air, and fearlessly charged through space 
towards the uplifted clubs, crying her warn- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


ing almost too late to avert what looked like 
disaster to both. 

La ! la ! Look out there, you girl with 
the clubs ! I'm coming ! ” 

The girl with the clubs, thus unceremo- 
niously addressed, moved quickly to one side, 
almost without breaking the regularity of 
her exercise. The little brown maiden 
swung by, and sprang quickly for an opposite 
rope with the agility of a circus performer. 
She looked scarcely more than twelve years 
old, though really sixteen, with her round 
head covered by short brown curls, and her 
short dress displaying two thin little legs 
that had long ago given her the nickname 
of “Spider.” Swinging from her rope, she 
resembled the little squirrel-monkey called 
the lemur, and her face was full of brightness 
and merriment. 

“ You got out of the way just in time. 
Miss Nancy,” she called, nothing daunted 
by the indifference of the girl who still 



Thk Little Bkowx Maiden swung 


BY 




» 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


9 


swung her clubs, but who suddenly, on hear- 
ing herself called Miss Nancy,” flushed 
half angrily, then, holding her clubs sus- 
pended, said, — 

Why do you call me Miss Nancy ? My 
name is Anna ; at home they call me Nan.” 

I 'm glad it is n’t Nancy. It does n’t 
suit you to be Miss Nancy. I’ll call you 
Nan. I like you. You sit in my division. 
You don’t get acquainted very easily, — a 
week is a long time to keep so stand olf. 
My name is Julia Brinkerhofl, but then no- 
body ever calls me Julia. Jill is what 
they call me generally; sometimes Gypsy, 
sometimes ^ Spider,’ and once in a while 
other names not nearly so polite. You may 
call me Jill. I wish you would do those 
movements again. We never had any one 
in the girls’ ^gym’ who could swing clubs 
like that.” 

Glad to resume her occupation, and ap- 
parently no novice in it, the new girl began 


10 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


again, counting half audibly, until there 
suddenly came across her line of vision, and 
close within the arc of her movements, a 
figure unlike any other in the room, clothed 
in a perfectly white uniform. 

A murmur ran through the ranks of girls, 
signifying surprise and admiration, while in 
whispers spread the news, — 

It is the new teacher ! ” 

^ Divinely tall and most divinely fair,’ ” 
said Gertrude Sands, a sentimental girl, who 
at once dedicated her next week’s allowance 
to a bouquet for this lovely being. 

The lovely being,” however, placed her- 
self in no attitude for homage, but, coming 
into the centre of the hall, produced from the 
recesses of a pocket artistically concealed in 
her gymnasium skirt a tape measure, which 
she drew through her fingers with the pro- 
fessional air of an artistic dressmaker, as 
with a low laugh she said, — 

I suppose I must call myself your new 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


11 


teacher, though I see one young person who 
can teach me something about club swinging. 
The first thing for me to do is to take your 
measures, not for new uniforms, though 
yours might be improved, but for new bodies. 
1 can see that some of you need certain 
exercises which others do not. 1 shall write 
your measures in my book, and by and by 
we will take them again, and see how much 
we have gained by our work together. My 
young friend, the club swinger, — may 1 ask 
your name ? — 1 can almost believe you have 
ideal measurements. Where did you learn 
to swing clubs ? ” 

The young girl thus called into promh 
nence was tall and lithe, with broad strong 
shoulders and free carriage. Her bright 
hair, in which the childish golden had begun 
to deepen to tones of varying brown, fell in 
two heavy braids below her waist, and was 
brushed back from a forehead which but for 
stray locks loosened by her exercise might 


12 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


have been severely broad and high. Her 
eyes were of that deep dark blueness which 
so readily become black with emotion. She 
seemed utterly unconscious of the whispered 
comments of the girls, whose envy had been 
aroused by the attention she had obtained 
from the new teacher. She submitted to the 
measurements of waist and shoulders with 
only a heightened color, answering the ques- 
tions the new teacher had asked simply like 
a child of ten, yet in a straightforward 
manner more like a boy than a girl. 

My name is Ratcliffe, Nan Ratcliffe. 
My cousin Hal and the boys taught me to 
swing clubs. What are we to call you ? ” 

Sure enough, you don’t know my name. 
It is Margaret Eliot; ” with a soft little laugh 
that started a ripple which eddied away to 
the farthest group of girls. Then drawing 
her figure up with a sort of conscious dignity, 
as if she must really begin to be the teacher, 
she said, — 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


13 


I shall have to ask six of you over there 
to go into the dressing-room and take off 
your uniforms. I cannot tell much about 
your figures in those blouses. I will come 
in and make my physical examinations ; after 
that six others, and so on as fast as we can.’' 

Miss Eliot followed the girls who were 
designated, leaving the others to extol her 
graces after the manner of school girls every- 
where. Is n’t she perfectly lovely ? What 
glorious eyes ! What a sweet voice ! What 
a splendid figure ! ” 

Nan Ratcliff e, I should think you must 
feel awfully set up to be singled out at once 
as her favorite.” 

don’t think Miss Eliot meant to show 
any partiality, — I happened to be the only 
girl exercising.” 

Oh, you can afford to be modest. I 
would give anything to have her praise me 
like that,” said Gertrude Sands. 

I wish I could do some of my class work 


14 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


as well as gymnastics. You, girls, have the 
advantage of me in so many other ways,” 
said Nan, modestly. 

Oh, you ’ll come out all right,” said the 
little brown maid, whose trapeze exercise had 
entirely escaped Miss Eliot’s notice, but who 
now stood beside Nan RatclifEe, regarding her 
with an enthusiastic admiration which had 
something of condescension in it. You ’ll 
come out all right, if you are a country 
girl. You are first-rate.” 

Nan could hardly fail to like this little 
brown girl who had enrolled herself as her 
friend, and the two passed on together to 
submit to the physical examination as the 
others came out of the dressing-room. 

^^We are going to have our backbones 
straightened, the girls say,” said Julia. 

I ’m all right ; there is nothing the matter 
with my spine,” as she wriggled herself out 
of her uniform and stood as straight and as 
sharp as a needle in silk tights, while Miss 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


15 


Eliot pinched her and punched her from neck 
to thigh and from thigh to ankles. 

You are pretty nearly all right — Miss 
Midget — What is your name ? ” 

Julia Brinkerhoff/’ demurely. 

Miss Julia. But you have a habit of 
standing on one foot that will spoil your little 
figure.’' 

^^How could you tell that?'*’ asked Jill, 
her black eyes snapping like those of a sur- 
prised monkey. 

‘‘ Oh, one of your thighs and one of your 
shoulders tell that.” 

Well, what is the matter with Nan Rat- 
cliffe ? ” 

Nan, who had vanished into her own little 
dressing-corner, waited the new physical ex- 
amination with more curiosity than amuse- 
ment, and while the teacher laid her soft hands 
on her firm flesh, felt a pleasurable sensation 
in the knowledge that she had no deformities 
to be brought to light. 


16 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Vertebrae normal — thighs even — shoul- 
ders — shoulders — my dear — do you play 
the violin ? ” 

A little,” said Nan, falteringly, but with 
almost as much belief in the magic of Miss 
Eliot’s art as had Julia. 

That ’s it ; left shoulder just a little off 
the line, brought about by holding your 
violin not quite right. We will straighten 
that. It does not amount to anything. But 
perfection can’t afford a flaw. I will give 
you some home exercises. You really have 
ideal measurements, a splendid physique.’^ 
Going rapidly from one to the other, the 
new teacher had soon made a category of the 
physiques of the girls which was a surprise 
to themselves, not always agreeable, and 
many of them felt that the power to see 
ourselves as ithers see us ” is not a gift to 
be lightly asked of the gods. 

Miss Eliot was, however, there to hold the 
mirror up to nature; yet she softened the 


NAN IN TOE CITY. 


17 


disagreeable truths by telling some pleasant 
ones, and saying, — 

It is as much our duty to make the 
most of our bodies as our brains, and we 
can all learn to cultivate our good points 
and correct our bad ones. I shall not only 
give you the exercises that will do you all 
good together, but each of you a set of 
rules to follow at home.” 

Never was feminine form more perfect 
than that of the white-robed apostle of 
Swedish teaching who then proceeded to 
weave a mystic spell around the young 
hearts of the Junior class, by the intricate 
and systematic mysteries of her cult. 

Then the great gong sounded the hour’s 
end, and with a brief Good afternoon ” the 
vision of loveliness vanished and twenty girls 
made a frantic rush to lockers and dressing- 
rooms. It was the last hour of the session, 
and the girls were going home. The new 
girl ” lingered, partly because, being a new 


18 


NAN IN TriE CITY. 


girl/’ she had not rushed with the others 
for precedence in the dressing-rooms, and so 
was left with the very last to find a corner 
for her dressing. 

Her brain was still whirling with the mazy 
rhythm of Miss Eliot’s exercises, as she swung 
her book strap to the last echoing measures 
of the pianist’s music, when the low sweet 
voice was again at her side. 

Shall we walk on together. Miss Eat- 
cliffe ? ” — just then the simplest words that 
anybody would say, but yet the music of the 
spheres could not have been more heavenly 
to the school girl in the first ecstasy of lov- 
ing a new teacher. It was as though Miss 
Eliot had said, The moon is made of green 
cheese ; let’s take a bite, my dear,” and it had 
sounded in her heart as We ’ll sup with 
the gods to-night on nectar and ambrosia.” 

Walk with me, walk with me, on, on, on 
forever,” said Nan’s heart. “ I thought I 
should ride,” said Nan’s tongue, stupidly 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


19 


and perversely, as she turned as red as a 
peony. 

Oh, I am so sorry,’' said Miss Eliot, “ I 
wanted to get acquainted with you ; we are 
both strangers at school, you know.” 

“ Acquainted with me ? What an angel ! ” 
sang Nan’s heart ; and her tongue : I think 
I will walk, after all. I usually do, and it 
is not very late.” 

Where do you live ? ” asked the divinity, 
using commonplace language for her heavenly 
messages. 

In Elm Avenue,” said Nan, briefly, fear- 
ing lest Her ” way should lead elsewhere. 

That ’s just my way,” said the low voice. 

‘‘ The way to the stars,” said Nan’s heart ; 
but her tongue said nothing, and her feet 
seemed to stumble over each other in per- 
verse clumsiness. 

You said that you learned to swing clubs 
from watching the boys ; I suppose you have 
brothers ? ” said Miss Eliot, looking down in 


20 


% 

NAN IN THE CITY. 


a friendly way from the majesty of her 
splendid height and smiling with those gra- 
cious brown eyes. 

Brothers, boys — boys, brothers,” echoed 
Nan’s ears ; I suppose I must answer.” 

Oh, not brothers ; our boys taught me, our 
camp boys ! I live in New Hampshire ; my 
father has a summer camp for boys. I 
don’t know anything about girls in general ; 
I don’t like them much. The boys are 
my friends. With them I row, play ball 
and tennis ; that is how I happen to be so 
strong.” 

Was she talking or only trying to talk? 
Surely Miss Eliot looked as though she were 
listening to somebody, and perhaps she was 
talking after all. 

Gro on, my dear. Tell me something more 
about it. I knew you were n’t a city girl.” 

Of course, I am so awkward,” said Nan, 
bluntly. 

Oh, no, I did not mean that,” said Miss 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


21 


Eliot, laughing and laying one hand on Nan’s 
arm. You are so free in your motions, so 
frank in your eyes, — quite like a little girl 
whom Dame Nature has chosen for a favor- 
ite, and Madam Grundy cannot spoil. Tell 
me some more, my dear.” 

And Nan, glad to speak of her dear Camp 
Chicopee, plunged rapidly on. Oh, we do 
have such jolly times at the lake. It was 
so hard to leave it. But of course the boys 
go away in the fall, but the lake is there and 
our own boat. Once in a while I would give 
all Brooklyn for an hour with my boat. 
But they are all so good to me here. I stay 
with Mrs. Prince — Mrs. Reginald Prince,” 
said Nan slowly, with a little consciousness 
of the city worth of Mrs. Prince’s first name, 
which had its reward in a smile of recog- 
nition from Miss Eliot, who said, — 

Mrs. Reginald Prince. Oh, yes — of 
course I know who she is. Are you her 
niece ? ” 


22 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Oh, no, the boys belong to our camp and 
they have no sister, so Mrs. Prince has been 
very kind to me, because — because — I am 
a sort of adopted sister to the boys. Lewis 
and Mrs. Prince would have liked me to go 
to a fashionable school, but there were so 
many considerations. I can’t afford to be 
just ornamental. I have got to take care of 
myself by and by, and the course at Pratt is 
just what I need.” 

^^And you chose to go to Pratt very 
wisely, my dear, though it must have taken 
considerable strength of mind to do so if Mrs. 
Prince preferred the fashionable school.” 

Oh, she did n’t influence me, — Mrs. 
Prince is so large-minded, — papa calls her 
the ^ best rounded ’ woman he knows. Some 
clever people are so frumpish, you know, 
and some well-bred people so stupid ; but 
she is clever and well bred and philan- 
thropic and everything. I am sorry I 
could n’t make up my mind to go to the 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


23 


Packer, for I did like some of the girls Mrs. 
Prince asked to luncheon — and some of the 
girls at our school are rather queer. But I 
don’t know any of them well, and perhaps 
I seem just as queer to them.” 

‘^You and I must be friends, and learn 
together to find the good points of the 
girls, who probably have not all had the 
advantages of your home surroundings and 
have few of them anything but self-support 
to look forward to. It is a great boon 
to Brooklyn that the Pratt will really fit 
girls to be workers, and skilled, thoroughly 
educated workers, not half-taught bunglers. 
You must come to see me in the little 
flat where I live with a friend, another 
teacher. We like to see any of our girls on 
Thursday afternoons, and will give you a cup 
of chocolate.” 

^^Oh, thank you so much. Here we are 
at Mrs. Prince’s.” 

They had passed from street to street 


24 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


lined with narrow brick houses set in close 
blocks but shaded with pleasant trees, just 
beginning to lose their foliage, until they 
reached a broad avenue bordered on each 
side with beautiful houses set in well-kept 
lawns, resembling the streets of the smaller 
New England capitals much more than those 
of the Long Island suburbs of the metropolis 
of the United States. 

This street is like an oasis in a desert,” 
said Miss Eliot, as they paused to say good- 

by- 

Oh, yes, I believe I should die of home- 
sickness if Mrs. Prince’s house did not have 
windows on all sides.” 

You are indeed favored, my dear. Come 
some Thursday ; ” and shaking hands in 
cordial fashion, Miss Eliot passed on, the 
swing of her skirt and the carriage of her 
arms telling the pleasant tale of physical 
culture. 

And when she had passed^ it seemed like 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


25 


the ceasing of exquisite music,” said Nan, 
being at that age when the language of 
poets seems fitly to express the language of 
the heart. 

That night when the lamp was lighted on 
the library table and Nan and Lewis sat 
silently conning their lessons, Margaret 
Eliot, Madge, Maggie, Mag,” sang itself into 
the lines of Nan’s geometrical problem, 
through the sense of physiology, into the 
very letter of her English literature. She 
is quite different from any of the others, and 
she really did single me out. I am so glad 
Cousin Hal taught me those new movements 
with the clubs. Margaret Eliot. And Mrs. 
Prince says she will ask her to dinner.” 


CHAPTER IL 


IN WHICH SOME THREADS ARE TIED. 

I T had taken Nan much longer to become 
accustomed to the changed conditions 
of her life than it would seem from the 
brief sketch of them given to her new 
teacher. 

It was already six weeks since she left 
her New Hampshire hills, and for three 
weeks she had been like a bird imprisoned in 
a golden cage, and Mrs. Prince had almost 
despaired of her power to wean her from her 
country life. The boys hardly knew their 
playmate of Camp Chicopee, in the quiet 
pale girl who had been transplanted. All 
efforts to arouse an interest in city sights and 
attractions were unavailing for a time. Even 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


27 


the beauty of Mrs. Prince’s home, one of 
those rare city houses built back from the 
street line and surrounded by plots of grass 
and trees on all sides, and the many evi- 
dences of luxury grated upon the girl at first, 
and seemed only to increase her distance from 
the simple New England home. But wise 
Mrs. Prince was patient and waited, and one 
day she told her how they treated the home- 
sick girls in foreign schools, where home- 
sickness is recognized as a malady as real as 
any other, and just as curable by time and 
the right medicine. 

Why, my dear, when I was your age at 
school in Germany, I saw more than one poor 
girl put to bed and dosed with tea, sometimes 
herb tea, for a severe attack of what the 
Germans call Heimweh, for the Germans are 
a very sentimental race, and the emotions 
have to be recognized. Then, after the 
homesick girl was put to bed for a day or 
two, and visited and coddled, one or two 


28 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


girls were sent to her room to get acquainted 
and make friends, and soon the Heimweh 
disappeared and the girl took her place in 
the class, where her presence had not been 
required during this attack of acute home- 
sickness.’' 

Mrs. Prince had told this little story en- 
tirely without attempt at applying it to Nan’s 
particular case, and she did not try to adorn 
it with a moral by saying : You, dear 
child, are not in a boarding-school with 
strangers and without many comforts, but 
you are in a lovely home, with friends ready 
to minister to your every desire, and before 
you an opportunity to do what you like.” 
Wise Mrs. Prince knew better than that, 
and she knew that after the strangeness had 
worn away, Nan’s own good sense would 
come to her rescue ; but she also recalled the 
love of the Swiss for his mountains, as the 
fiercest form of homesickness, something 
harder to overcome a hundred times than 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


29 


any homesickness known to the German 
school girl. 

Lewis’s programme of distraction was of 
little avail, and to Nan the increasing roar 
and turmoil of the great New York streets 
was too great a contrast to the silent 
grandeur of her beloved hills to be enjoyed, 
and even the wonders of Central Park and 
Macy’s were a torment to her vexed little 
heart. Lewis was naturally a city boy. His 
summers at the lake had been a pleasure 
for him, but he loved the crowds of the city 
streets, the city sights and sounds. His 
sketch book was filled with the types of city 
life. He loved to make caricatures of the 
groups on the street corners in Lower Broad- 
way or of the girls on Fifth Avenue. 

When Nan said, I would give all Broad- 
way for one of our hills,” Lewis said : Oh, 
Nan, wait till you learn to love it. Why, 
you can’t understand how I love it. Some- 
times I think if I should die, I would like to 


30 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


be buried in front of Trinity Church, where 
the crowds from Wall Street would walk 
over my head every day.” 

Oh, Lewis,” Nan protested, how can 
you ? I’m sure I should want to be in 
better company, or at least in peace, at the 
foot of a hill in the farthest country nook.” 

I did not think you were such a born 
country girl. Nan,” said Lewis, with more 
real temper than he often showed to Nan. 

I told you so, Lewis ; you were bound to 
be disappointed in me. I never shall like 
the city, though I will get used to it, and 
am going to study hard and make the most 
of it, and I don’t mean to be ungrateful to 
your dear mamma, not a bit.” 

But I mean you shall like it. Nan,” 
Lewis said, if I fight it out on this line all 
winter, as Grant said. You may hate New 
York as much as you please, but you ’ve got 
to like Brooklyn. Why, it ’s your native 
heath. You were born here.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


31 


Yes, I know that/’ said Nan, and that 
is the most melancholy part of it. I ’m a 
kind of traitor, after all. Well, I’ll try to 
get over this hateful feeling. I ’ll tell you 
what, Lewis, — I believe I would like to go 
down to the beach. I remember ever so 
long ago, when we lived in Brooklyn, the sea 
rolling out ever so far to meet the sky. I 
think I would like to see it again.” 

Of course, why did n’t we think of that ? ” 
said Lewis; and that very day Mrs. Prince 
went with them to that level coast plain of 
Long Island against which the great Atlantic 
beats its measureless tide year after year 
with infinite grandeur. The summer visi- 
tors had all gone, and only a few autumn 
lovers of the waves straggled up and down 
upon the beach. The little boys who had 
spent many hours on that playground were 
soon busy at making forts in the sand, and 
Nan was happy, happier than in many 
weeks, as the waves dashed louder up against 


32 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


the breakwater and came closer to their feet, 
then out again to rock some incoming ship. 

Lewis took out his pencil and sketched a 
bit of sea and sky line where two great 
ocean steamers sent back faint smoke spiral 
good-byes to the continent they were leaving, 
and Nan feasted eyes and heart on the vast 
beauty of it all, and then went back to her 
new home happier and wiser, with an appetite 
for a late dinner and a zeal for the next day. 

It was after this that she began to show 
some real interest in the life about her, and 
then Mrs. Prince saw that the question of a 
school was not one which Nan would have 
decided for her without some chance of 
choice. It was like Mrs. Prince to put aside 
all her own engagements for the next few 
weeks, and to invite young girls of her 
acquaintance to dine, — young girls from 
different schools in the city, who might help 
Nan to make this choice; and it was like 
Lewis to say, — 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


33 


Oh, mamma, why such a dose of girls ? 
Must Nan have them as antidotes to the 
boys ? We have had Packer girls, and 
Adelphi girls, and private school girls, and 
public school girls, and pretty girls, and plain 
girls, and I don’t believe Nan likes one 
better than she does another, and I don’t 
believe she cares a fig where she goes to 
school.” 

Now, that is just where you are mis- 
taken, Master Lewis,” said Nan, a little 
indignantly, for she liked to have a mind 
of her own above all. I like all of these 
girls well enough, but I don’t think I could 
ever be one of them. They are so orna- 
mental — and they don’t seem to mean any- 
thing. Is n’t there a school in that Institute 
where we go to get library books ? ” 

Why, yes, to be sure, there ’s the Pratt, 
mamma,” said Lewis ; “ but we don’t know 
any girls do we, mamma, who go there? 
There aren’t any girls in our set.” 

3 


34 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Why, Lewis, I ’m ashamed of you. Are 
you going to be one of the men Byron speaks 
of when he says, — 

^ He thinks his little set mankind ' ? 

Of course there is the Pratt. I know a 
number of young ladies who are taking 
special courses there. Why, Hattie Duryea 
is studying architecture there, and Mary 
Armstrong cooking, and Lizzie Walters 
kindergarten, and Bessie Page dressmaking, 
and Constance Dalton designing. But they 
are special students. You want a regular 
school course. Nan. We will go over and 
see about the Technical High School course. 
I had not thought of that, because they do 
so little with languages and literature, — no 
Latin, very little German, a great deal of 
science,” said Mrs. Prince. 

That ’s just what I want. I don’t care 
to learn just to talk about things, I want to 
be able to do things. Can’t we go this very 
day, Mrs. Prince, and see about it ? ” 


NAN IN TUE CITY. 


35 


And so, as it happened that the school of 
the useful arts was but a short distance from 
Mrs. Prince’s, as soon as breakfast was 
over they were on their way, loaded with 
books to be changed at the library; and 
when Nan had been carried to the top of 
the large building, which is inside and out 
of brick, and had seen what the brain of a 
single man and the money of a millionaire 
had devised for the education of girls and 
boys and men and women, she had more 
respect for brick walls and rich men than 
she ever had before. And when she had 
seen the great gymnasium, and the assembly 
hall, and the hundred work-rooms for every 
kind of industry, from making starch to 
making houses, and from chemical labora- 
tories to art studios, she began to be very 
grateful for the privilege of being in Brook- 
lyn. Then when she found that there were 
class-rooms and teachers and girls and boys, 
her courage began to fail a little ; and 


36 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


when the examination papers were given 
her, and a very kind teacher gave her a 
desk and pencil and paper, it took all her 
courage to fill them out to the best of her 
ability. And what rejoicing there was when 
one eventful morning an official envelope 
came by post, containing the announcement 
that she had passed her examinations so 
well that she could enter the second class 
instead of the freshman; and when Lewis 
saw her papers with their high rank in 
algebra and arithmetic, geography and Amer- 
ican history, he said, with a superior air, 
taking up his Yirgil, I could never have 
answered half of them, but then you have n’t 
had a bit of Latin or Greek.” 

And I don’t want any,” said Nan, going 
ofi to read that precious paper, and to con 
the prospectus for her school year, which 
was to give her geometry, chernistry, botany, 
cooking, millinery, drawing, besides many 
other commonplace studies. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


37 


She had spent more than a week at the 
model school when Miss Eliot came and 
seemed to bring a new element into Nan’s 
steady-going life. Jill, too, had decided to 
do her best to break down the reserve of 
the girl from New Hampshire ; so that, as 
the days of the term lengthened into weeks. 
Nan found that her new life was to be 
made up of much that was not study, and 
that sometimes we can learn outside of 
books more than we can in them. 

At home there was always Lewis for 
comradeship, and the little boys to be petted 
and told stories, and by almost daily post 
letters from one and another of the camp 
boys at school or college. 

Cousin Harold and Steve Whittemore were 
hardly three miles away, working with that 
brave colony of young men, called the Uni- 
versity Settlement,” who are trying to help 
the poor people of the East Side in New 
York ; for Hal, though he had begun the prac- 


38 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


tice of law, had not too much to do as yet, 
and his leisure was spent in gathering the 
street boys into clubs for work and recrea- 
tion, teaching them out of his experience at 
Camp Chicopee lessons of truth and honor, 
self-respect and courage ; and Steve Whitte- 
more, though in the Divinity School, had 
thrown in his lot with Harold, and the two 
young men had furnished for themselves a 
tiny flat in the top of a tenement house. As 
frequently as they could spare the time, 
both came to Mrs. Prince’s. And Marshall, 
at Princeton, had still the habit of five years 
of writing a weekly letter to Nan, his little 
playmate of six summers, and if these letters 
were very full of football just now. Nan 
enjoyed them the more. 

Her awe of Miss Eliot soon passed away, 
and she realized that her teacher was, after all, 
a girl not many years older than herself, with 
a girl’s hopes and dreams, but following a 
chosen career from an exalted love of art 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


39 


and action. A college girl, Miss Eliot too 
had joined some of her friends in the fellow- 
ship work in the College Settlement, al- 
though of this Nan was yet to know more. 
She seemed still to her the most beautiful 
creature she had ever seen, with her lovely 
chestnut hair and wonderful brown eyes, in 
which Nan could often see that stray golden 
gleam that lights the eyes of the Gordon 
setter. 

Jill, with her audacious familiarity, soon 
knocked down all barriers between herself 
and Nan, and although, like Lewis, from the 
tip of her saucy tongue to the end of her 
dancing toes a product of city life, she 
forced Nan to enjoy her society and to give 
her her confidence. 

If it had not been for Jill, Nan would 
never have responded to Miss Eliot’s invita- 
tion to her Thursday afternoon ; ” but Jill, by 
a method of her own, had discovered that Nan 
wished but dared not make a formal call. 


40 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Never did such a thing in my life ; 
shouldn’t know how to behave,” said Nan, 
somewhat bluntly. 

Don’t suppose you ever did up in 
Chicopee. Not much conversation in trees, 
that I ever heard of,” said Miss Jill. But 
here, my dear Nan, you are in a city, where 
people do make calls, and it ’s time for you 
to learn how.” 

But school girls don’t make calls,” said 
Nan. 

I suppose they must, or Miss Eliot 
would not take the trouble to make choco- 
late every Thursday and ask us to come. 
I am going next Thursday, and you may go 
if you want to.” Jill was busy with her 
book-strap, and did not look up as she 
snapped these words and her buckle at the 
same time. 

Nan ignored the question, but replied with 
another, What time will you go ? ” 

About half-past four. I ’ll be on the 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


41 


corner of Fulton and J Streets. If you are 
not there, I suppose I shall have to go 
alone?” 

Nan did not say whether she would he 
there or not, but Jill knew that she would, 
and Nan had waited five minutes impatiently 
before Jill appeared on the appointed day. 
There was a look of mischievous merriment 
in Jill’s face when she came in sight, and 
she said, — 

Oh, you thought you would come ? ” 

The girls were as great a contrast in ap- 
pearance as in disposition, — Nan with her 
clear-eyed, steady, honest face, large strong 
frame, and fine carriage, reflective and cour- 
ageous ; Jill with her roguish, coquettish 
features, her spry and tiny graceful figure, 
alert and wary, alive at every point. 

Do you know where the Escurial is, 
Jill ? ” asked Nan, in the hopeless way of one 
who despairs of ever finding a new street in 
a great city. 


42 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Of course I do,” said Jill, with the confi- 
dence of the girl who has never let anything 
escape her observation since she began to 
notice her own toes, at the tender age of 
four weeks. 

Can we walk there ? asked Nan. 

‘^Well, yes, unless you are lame and halt 
and blind, since it is only four blocks from 
this spot. Now, Nan, you just notice how 
easy it is ; follow your nose, and you will be 
at the Escurial in about five minutes.” 

Have n’t we heard that the Escurial was 
built in the form of a gridiron in honor of 
St. Lawrence ? If so, flat-iron would be 
more appropriate for a flat house, don’t you 
think so ? ” said Jill, as they were mount- 
ing to the top floor of the apartment house 
in the elevator. 

Of course both girls laughed, and having 
once begun to laugh they kept on laughing, 
standing before the door after they had left 
the elevator, waiting until they could stop 


I^AN IN THE CITY. 


43 


laughing enough to ring the bell, and in 
agony of mind lest somebody should come 
out and find them laughing. Nan was the 
first to compose herself, and with very rigid 
muscles pressed the electric button which 
was the open sesame ” of their hopes. 

Jill, stuffing her pocket-handkerchief into 
her mouth, stifled back the final giggle, 
and when the maid appeared she was as 
presentable as Nan. It was a relief to both 
girls when the maid seemed to understand 
the ways of school girls, and did not ask for 
their cards, but ushered them at once into 
the little drawing-room, where they found 
Miss Eliot and a lovely lady with silvery 
hair, whom she called Aunt Ellen ’’ and 
who had been a teacher many years, two 
girls from the Pratt, and, way ofi in a corner, 
apparently attending to the steaming tea- 
kettle, a young man. 

Why, Cousin Hal ! ” said Nan. 

Why, Nan ! ” said Cousin Hal. 


44 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Why, Mr. Ratcliff e, is Nan your cousin ? 
said Miss Eliot. 

And then followed explanations, that 
Cousin Harold, having gotten into difficulties 
about a poor boy who had come to the Set- 
tlement for aid, and having found that the 
boy was a Brooklyn boy and that Miss Eliot 
had been kind to him, had come to her. 
For he knew Miss Eliot, because they had 
met in strange places on the East Side, where 
babies were sick and fathers were drunk and 
mothers were hungry, and Hal had seen Miss 
Eliot take babies, and mothers too, right 
off to the college house to be fed and clothed, 
and he hadn’t any idea that she had any- 
thing else to do but that, or that she had any 
classes in anything ; and that in a big city 
she should know Nan was the last thing 
he should have thought of. Miss Eliot, 
knowing him as one of the good fellows 
who lived down there in the slums because 
they wish to and not because they have to, 


NAN IN TnE CITY. 


45 


knew him and his friend, whom the poor 
called Saint Stephen,” only as workers 
with them, seeing them in and out of all 
sorts of unhappy homes, had never for a 
moment thought of their knowing Nan. 

And Nan, looking at Cousin Hal, whose 
beard of last summer’s growth had been 
shaven, and whose dress was not of camp 
nor of slums but of city fashion, could not 
help wondering if Miss Eliot did not think 
him rather nice looking ; and when she 
looked at Miss Eliot in her pretty yellow 
afternoon dress, with its sheen of ribbons 
and fluff of lace. Nan hardly questioned that 
Cousin Harold must find her very fair to 
look at. But both were too much absorbed 
in the history of Dicky Flynn to show any 
signs of personal interest in each other. 
Cousin Harold said, — 

The boy is only thirteen years old, and 
yet he is supporting a mother and a baby 
sister besides himself. He has sold papers. 


46 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


candy, blacked boots, and everything you 
can think of, and he has a marvellous eye to 
the main chance. But he has n’t any con- 
science. He makes his boast of the number 
of Sunday-schools he has ^worked’ for 
clothes for the baby and himself. His 
mother wants to get some stock for a little 
store, and I have heard of a good little 
place, if there was any woman to investi- 
gate the case.” 

Of course I will with pleasure,” said 
Miss Eliot. Dicky is an old friend of 
Aunt Ellen’s. She was instrumental in 
getting him into her Sunday-school several 
years ago, when her object was to save his 
morals from corruption. Unfortunately, 
Dicky thought a great deal more about the 
Christmas tree mittens and other perquisites 
than he did about telling the truth ; and when 
she found that he had gotten several pairs 
of mittens from different mission schools and 
sold them at a profit to newsboys, she began 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


47 


to lose faith in him. However, she hears from 
him and his mother periodically, when they 
are about to be turned out of doors or Dicky 
wants to change his business.” 

Yes, Mr. Ratcliffe, Dicky belongs dis- 
tinctly to this side of the Bridge rather than 
the other. I don’t see how he happened to 
drift to the Settlement,” said Aunt Ellen. 

“ He investigates; he is a real little Yankee, 
and interests me,” said Harold. Then turn- 
ing to Nan, who had listened with wonder to 
this tale of the boy without a conscience, he 
said, — 

You Ve come to a queer world, little coz, 
and perhaps you ’d like to visit our corner 
of it by and by.” Then, shaking hands 
with Miss Eliot, he patted Nan’s shoulder in 
a cousinly fashion and was gone, leaving the 
girls to chocolate and chatter. 


CHAPTER in. 


NAN VISITS THE COLLEGE SETTLEMENT. 

T T AYE you had the measles, Nan ? 

JLA Mrs. Prince sat in a low chair in 
her own room, working upon a piece of em- 
broidery, when Nan, going through the hall 
on her return from school one Friday after- 
noon, was arrested by this somewhat start- 
ling question from that lady. 

Why, certainly, Mrs. Prince, ever so long 
ago,” Nan answered, entering the room anx- 
iously, with the thought of Wolcott upper- 
most in her mind. 

And the whooping-cough ? ” asked Mrs. 
Prince. 

Yes, indeed,” with a smile. 

And scarlet fever ? ” Mrs. Prince pur- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


49 


sued, looking at Nan, whose anxiety had 
altered to perplexity. 

I don’t think so ; but do I look ill ? ” 
asked Nan, stepping to the mirror to have 
all fears on that score set aside by the vision 
of ruddy cheeks and sparkling eyes. 

You look ill ? My dear, not in the least ; 
but your cousin Harold has written to ask 
us, you and Lewis and myself, to his Boys’ 
Club Saturday night in the Settlement. It 
is not in a savory locality, you know, and 
there is always some danger of infectious 
diseases. However, if you have had the 
ordinary children’s diseases, I think your 
good condition a safeguard against much. 
Would you enjoy going?” 

Of course. I think it would be so inter- 
esting. May we go ? But why do you look so 
funny ? Is there any other stumbling-block ?” 

Well, Hal asks two favors, — one that you 
will bring your violin, the other that Lewis 
will do some charcoal drawing for them.” 

4 


50 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Oh, oh ! ” said Nan, for a moment taken 
back by the suggestion. I could not play 
in public ; I don’t play well enough for that.” 

It is hardly playing in public, dear ; 
it is giving your mite. You know Harold 
and his friends are trying so hard to gain 
influence over those boys who are so tempted 
to spend their nights on the street. He and 
Steve have worked very hard this fall to 
keep the little boys and older ones in the 
Club, by amusing and teaching them. Har- 
old says it would be of great help to them 
both, and to the boys themselves, if you and 
Lewis would lend your talent, small as it is, 
to them for one evening. You are both so 
young, little above many of the boys in 
age, that it would have a great effect with 
them.” 

I had not thought of it in that way at all. 
Of course, if I can help the hoys I will gladly 
play, if I can play well enough.” 

Certainly, my dear, some of your sim- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


51 


plest selections without your notes will be 
best.” 

But will Lewis do it ? ” asked Nan. 
do not know; but here he comes,” as 
a boyish step sprang up the stair, and Lewis 
bounded into his mother’s room with a 
merry greeting, — 

All well to-day, little mother ; monthly 
report ninety-seven, and the Poly boys going 
to play Stevens next Saturday.” Kissing 
his mother lightly on the cheek, the happy 
boy looked from one to the other quizzically : 

AYhat are you and Nan plotting now ?” 

They then laid Harold’s plan before Lewis, 
and it met his hearty approval. 

Just the thing ! Of course I ’ll go. To- 
morrow is it ? Well, that is better than later. 
Too much football next month.” 

Football ? Oh, Lewis,” said Mrs. Prince, 
I dread the football season!” 

Never mind, mother dear, don’t worry ! 
I won’t get hurt, — I’m only a full-back,” 


52 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


said Lewis, with his usual confidence in his 
good luck. Come, Nan, it ’s just half-past 
three; supposing we take a spin out to the 
park.” 

All right ! Just wait five minutes till I 
get my bicycle suit,” said Nan. 

Later in the afternoon, when they had 
returned, and found Mrs. Prince with the 
little boys in the library, Lewis said, — 
How are we going to get to that hole of 
a place to-morrow night ? ” 

We should take the cars in the da3dime, 
but I think to-morrow evening we will drive 
over the Bridge and up the East Side to 
within a short distance of the Settlement, 
where the streets are too crowded to be 
pleasant to drive through. Then I shall 
depend upon my son Lewis and Giovanni to 
protect us.” 

Giovanni ? Why, the Italian, mamma ? ” 
Well, you see, he is not too respectable- 
looking for the locality. He talks Italian, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


53 


which will be of much use in the neighbor- 
hood ; and then he is as strong as a lion and 
devoted to us. He will ride on the box with 
James.” 

As strong as a lion. I should say so. 
I wish you could have seen him, mamma, 
this afternoon just before the ashman came 
around for the barrels,” said Harry, jumping 
to his feet from the prostrate position on the 
rug at his mother’s feet. You know cook 
said that a little boy came last week and told 
her Giovanni sent him to put out the ash- 
barrels, and she let him put them out and gave 
him ten cents and some breakfast. Well, to- 
night that boy came again, and I told Van 
that was the boy. My eye ! how Giovanni 
went for him ! He took him so, and shook 
him just like a cat would a mouse,” said 
Harry, taking Wolcott by the collar by way 
of emphasis, till Wolcott screamed, Now 
quit that ! I did not take the ash-barrels.” 

^^Oh, did I hurt? Well, I guess that’s 


54 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


nothing to the way Giovanni shook that boy, 
jabbering at him in his jibberish, ^ Go ’long 
out dis block ! Ye stole my barr’ls. Dis my 
block. You ’s cheap folks. My barr’ls rich 
folks ; you go ’long to cheap blocks.’ I 
came up to Van and I said, ^You let go 
of that boy or I ’ll tell my mother ; he is 
a poor boy just like you, and maybe he is 
hungry.’ But the boy was so frightened he 
ran as fast as he could; but if I see him 
again I will give him some pennies.” 

But he did tell a lie, for Giovanni 
didn’t send him to take out our barrels,” 
said Wolcott. 

I suppose he did ; but it makes him tell 
lies, to be so hungry. He had a hungry 
look,” said Harry. 

The next time he comes, Harry, you let 
me know and we will find out about him,” 
said his mother, patting the little fellow’s 
hand. 

If he were n’t so devoted to us, Giovanni 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


55 


would be just insufEerable, but he has many 
good points. How hungry he looked, too, 
when he first began to take care of our 
furnace ! Now I believe he really thinks he 
has the monopoly of the block, and that if it 
were n’t for him the ashes of the ^ quality ’ 
would fall into the hands of some low-lived 
Irishman. He is, however, as honest and 
thrifty as he is bad-tempered and unintelligi- 
ble. To think that he knows so little English 
after two years in this country ! I believe 
if he could be persuaded to go to the night 
school over in the Settlement, it would work 
a great change in him. I will suggest it to 
Harold or Steve.” 

Lewis said, Oh, he always says, ^ Me too 
old learn read — seventeen, nineteen years 
old. ’ ” 

Saturday night came quickly enough after 
a good long holiday of out-of-door sport and 
exercise, — tennis at the school court for Nan, 


56 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


and football for Lewis, with all sorts of 
rough-and-tumble frolic for the little boys. 
Thanks to the bracing autumn air and their 
splendid health and youth, they felt no 
fatigue when after the six-o’clock dinner the 
carriage came to the door, and all were 
booted and saddled and ready for the 
fight,” as Lewis said, coming down the steps 
brandishing a masculine-looking implement 
in the shape of a cane, which however 
proved to be only the case for a huge roll 
of drawing-paper, while in his other hand 
he carried a box of charcoal and drawing 
materials. Nan with her violin strung over 
her shoulders followed, and both were joined 
by Mrs. Prince, to whom the little boys clung, 
saying, Good-night.” 

But at the foot of the steps stood Giovanni, 
smiling as only he could, and dressed as only 
he would, from top to toe in the most re- 
doubtable suit that ever fell from the hands 
of an auctioneer or graced the windows of 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


57 


a pawnbroker’s shop. Even Mrs. Prince, 
strong in her perfect self-command and well- 
bred composure, felt an irresistible impulse 
to laugh, and Lewis gave a low whistle, 
while Nan could not repress that anomalous 
sound, — a school-girl giggle. The Italian 
boy familiar to them all in the suitable and 
humble garments of his calling now ap- 
peared in a full evening suit of shiny black 
broadcloth. A low-cut white vest displayed 
a broad expanse of white shirt-bosom, orna- 
mented with red glass studs, and adorned 
with a flaming red necktie. In the lapel of 
his swallow-tail coat he wore a red sugar 
rose, the relic of Wolcott’s last birthday cake.^ 
In his ears small gold hoops dangled, and 
on his little finger a seal ring of royal dimen- 
sions, and a huge watch-chain heavy with 
charms completed this amazing costume. 

Conscious that he was a thing of beauty 
and a joy forever,” the Italian boy stood 

1 A true description. 


58 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


silent, smiling a smile peculiarly his own, — 
an invitation of approval and an expression 
of supreme satisfaction with himself. If the 
lad had been one of her own household ser- 
vants, Mrs. Prince would not have hesitated 
to send him off at once to change his cos- 
tume ; but the Italian boy was a free man, as 
it were, a lad whose services were only inter- 
mittent, and Mrs. Prince felt that she had no 
right to dictate to him upon a subject so 
clearly affecting his personal vanity. At 
the same time it seemed not improbable 
that they might be subjected to some ridi- 
cule over on the East Side, with an attendant 
of such flamboyant appearance. She was 
however equal to the situation, and said : 

Good evening, Giovanni. Take these things 
to the carriage, and stand by the horses a 
moment while James comes to me.” Then 
re-entering the house quickly, she re-ap- 
peared with a long ulster, which she handed 
to the coachman, who although loath to 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


69 


leave the horses with that jibbering Italian,” 
had come rapidly to the stoop. 

Take this ulster, J ames, and when Gio- 
vanni leaves the carriage, persuade him to 
put it over his evening suit. The poor 
fellow does not know that he is not suitably 
dressed, of course. Don’t make fun of him, 
but tell him that it is a bad neighborhood, 
and that he might lose his watch-chain. See 
that he buttons up his coat.” 

“ Yes, ma’am,” said the well-trained James, 
with perfect immovability, but inwardly vow- 
ing to dress that popinjay down.” He 
knew the Italian boy’s temper, however, too 
well to run the risk of disturbing the peace 
of Mrs. Prince’s drive by altercation with 
him ; and the means he used must have been 
pacific but efficacious, for when Giovanni 
jumped from the box at a familiar corner of 
the Bowery, the gorgeous attire was shrouded 
by a long melton ulster. 

Here was life with a hundred strange 


60 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


colors, — life of wliicli Nan had never dreamed, 
though it was vaguely familiar to Lewis. 
How far away seemed that broad sky above 
her beloved lake, as she caught but a flash 
here and there between the high buildings 1 
For here the sky indeed seemed still farther 
away, and she almost wondered if those 
people that crowded the sidewalks ever saw 
it at all. Never before had that beautiful 
home country seemed so distant; and yet, 
strangely enough, the homesickness that 
came into her heart made her pity these 
people who knew it not the more and to 
shrink from them less. 

Mrs. Prince drew her hand through her own 
arm, and pressed it silently ; then said, — 

It is n’t very pleasant, my dear, but they 
are not nearly so unhappy as you would be, 
and things are much better, a hundred times 
better, than they used to be, better even than 
last year before Mulberry Bend went. Now 
there is a breathing-place behind these build- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


61 


ings. There were others still dirtier and 
more closely packed with human beings. 
You see there is almost an air of joyousness 
about some of these people ; the women are 
out to market, because it is Saturday night, 
and their own or their husband’s wages have 
been paid.” 

Such a motley crowd passed by them; 
women screeching like peacocks or chatter- 
ing like magpies in the language of Italy or 
Spain, Russia or Poland, swarming around 
carts of merchandise drawn up in the gutters, 
— handcarts piled with cabbages none too 
fresh, exhaling the odors of sauerkraut ; 
push-carts with emaciated carcasses of last 
year’s fowl too tough to be sold elsewhere ; 
carts of onions, potatoes, wood, coal, fish, 
and fruit, — carts full of every kind of ware 
which could be sold for small money in 
small quantities. 

These handcarts were lighted, some by a 
small pine torch, others by oil lamps of tin 


62 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


which dripped unnoticed on whatever viand 
was near ; and each vender screamed his 
wares as loud as he could, sometimes in one 
language, sometimes in another, but seldom 
in English. The buyers were all women, 
bareheaded or with heads covered by gay 
kerchiefs of purple, yellow, and green. 

It was to Mrs. Prince a malodorous remi- 
niscence of a fair in some foreign city^ but 
to the children it appeared only novel and 
repulsive. They crept closer to Mrs. Prince, 
and Giovanni walked now in front and now 
behind, watching and warding every pos- 
sible danger, his eye on alleys and door- 
ways, curbstones and gutters, like a dog 
who knows the covers of his game. It was a 
mystery to Giovanni, — this Saturday night 
excursion to regions too unclean for such 
women as Mrs. Prince ; but he shared with 
all her proteges an implicit faith in her 
sense of right, and went on as faithfully as 
a hound. He did not like it himself. It 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


63 


smelled too much of the emigrant ship, and 
recalled the days when he had worked with 
pickaxe and shovel at digging up New York 
streets. Giovanni had a supreme contempt 
for the creature that he wcls before he entered 
upon the halcyon days of taking care of the 
furnaces of the quality, and incidentally 
feeding on the crumbs that fell from the rich 
man’s table. He even had a vista of a future 
when he might be an indoor man, polishing 
up the handles of the big front doors, and 
then, who knows ? a head waiter in a res- 
taurant where there was macaroni galore. 
To this end, no doubt, Giovanni had invested 
his hard-earned savings in this marvellous 
dress-suit. Alas that it should be dragged 
through the filth and scum of Hester Street ! 

But it is a long lane that has no turning, 
and their path soon turns from the noisome 
streets into a clean well-swept passage-way, 
and up a stairway to a well-lighted room, 
where are tables, chairs, and a piano and 


64 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


gentlemen. Surely Giovanni feels himself in 
good company once more^ and is tempted to 
throw aside that covering which obscures his 
gay person from the public gaze. Unwary 
one ! There are others besides those friendly 
gentlemen. There are rows of boys, — boys 
that are none too good for human nature’s 
daily food, and boys with a fine sense of 
humor. Awed by the presence of two such 
fine-looking ladies, these boys might have 
been still half an hour ; but the Italian ! 
he was one of them. 

Oh, the Dago, see the Dago dude ! Oh, 
my, where did you git that hat ? My eye, 
look at the posy. Ain’t he a daisy?” rose 
in a simultaneous cry from the boys seated 
and standing about the Club-room, in eager 
expectation of what entertainment the even- 
ing might furnish. Mrs. Prince saw that 
she had extricated herself from one difficulty 
only to fall into another, and she hastened 
to explain to Harold the presence and ap- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


65 


pearance of her extraordinary escort. With 
ready wit, Harold seized upon the point of 
vantage, and, clapping his hands to call the 
boys to order, said : Boys, this young man, 
Giovanni Laparello, is going to have his 
picture drawn for us, and my friend Lewis 
Prince is going to draw it here before us. 
Want to see him do it ? ” 

‘‘Fire ahead!” cried one voice. “Take 
the Dago’s picture,” cried another, while a 
general murmur of approval ran through 
the room. 

Giovanni himself, slightly startled by the 
turn of affairs, and somewhat loath to make 
himself any more conspicuous, was only per- 
suaded to carry out his part of the pro- 
gramme by a promise of a generous gift 
of money from Lewis, who knew the Ital- 
ian well enough to understand where he was 
weakest. 

He then seated himself on the platform 
with the air of a Narcissus, sure that no 
6 


66 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


canvas could do justice to his charms. 
Lewis unrolled his drawing-paper, tacked 
it on the wall, and, showing his charcoal 
pieces and stumping-wads to the boys, pro- 
ceeded to sketch with bold strokes the out- 
line of the Italian boy’s figure, not omitting 
the various eccentricities of his costume. 
Soon the sketch assumed a likeness which 
appealed to the boys, and they began to 
stamp and to whistle, and fill the air with 
amusing and characteristic comments. 

Now ain’t that bully ? ” 

Don’t forget the posy. Mister.” 

And that necktie. Mister.” 

Look at your mug now, Mr. Italian.” 

It was entirely a new experience to Lewis, 
and one which he endured with great credit 
to his breeding and temper, but it was one 
which did not encourage Nan for the ordeal 
before her, and her pulses ran cold and hot 
as Lewis’s drawing gained completion and 
with bold and rapid strokes and careful 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


67 


rubbing he produced the shadows which 
completed the likeness and brought out the 
wildest enthusiasm. 

But Nan’s apprehensions were premature, 
for the boys were too well satisfied with the 
rough sketch of the Italian to let the artist 
go at once. 

Give us something purty, give us your 
sister,” one lad called out, making a mis- 
take which it seemed unnecessary to correct, 
though Harold said, — 

This young lady, my cousin, is going to 
do something else for you, boys ; she will 
play the violin for you.” 

Let ’s hear her do it. Give us the 
fiddle. Will she dance too?” 

Strong and fearless, and now stirred with 
the impulse to help as well as amuse. Nan 
felt a curious admixture of feelings as these 
various cries met her ears and she looked 
over the audience and their Club-room. It 
was scrupulously clean, and a fresh coat of 


68 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


new paint added to the general air of whole- 
someness. The walls were hung with a 
number of good photographs, and, shining 
above all, Hoffman’s picture of the one 
perfect Boy Christ; at one end were well- 
filled book-shelves and a piano, and an 
open door gave a glimpse of a workshop 
where a carpenter’s bench and many tools 
told of evenings spent in work. 

The boys themselves were a hybrid lot, 
many of them Italians, Spanish, Hebrews, 
and Poles, with temperaments more or less 
poetic and melancholy ; here and there the 
Irish boy, with his quick wit and happy-go- 
lucky temperament ; but the general amal- 
gamation was the New York street boy. 

Nan hardly knew how to separate these 
types herself, as she glanced over her audi- 
ence before she drew her bow. To her they 
were just boys who had no conception of 
her world, — her mountains and her lake. 
Something not of herself made her touch 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


69 


tlie weird and tender chords of The Scar- 
let Sarafan,” an air simple in its melody, 
but pathetic and heartrending, as is so much 
of the Russian music. A little lad paler 
than the rest, with wistful dark eyes, dropped 
his head into his hands and let the tears rain 
through his fingers, and not one of those 
untutored little waifs offered in any way to 
tease or torment him for it. Nan had her 
audience fast, and the shuffling feet were still 
and the awkward hands forgot to fumble, 
as, without waiting for applause, she guided 
her bow through grave measures to gay, 
ending with a lively tarantelle. The little 
fellows were familiar enough with the Bow- 
ery theatres to think applause of the loudest 
kind in order, as Nan at last put down her 
violin, and with whistling and stamping 
signify their approval of this last number 
of the programme. 

That was just boss ; give us some more, 
Miss.” 


70 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Two or three of the younger boys came 
fearlessly forward, and seemed eager to touch 
Nan’s hand. The little lad who had been 
most moved by the Sarafan ” said timidly : 

Would you come some day and play to 
my grandmother ? She is sick, and some 
days the young ladies from the other Col- 
lege House come. My grannie loves music.” 
Nan met Mrs. Prince’s eye a moment, and 
saw only benevolence and interest, so that 
she ventured to say, — 

Yes, perhaps ; but what is your name, 
and where do you live ? ” 

“ Paul Ludovic, and I live in Madison 
Street.” 

Stephen Whittemore then stepped forward 
and said to Mrs. Prince : The little fellow 
is a Russian, and lives with his grandmother 
in Madison Street. He is under the special 
care of the young ladies of the College 
Settlement, who have been teaching him 
English and caring for his grandmother. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


71 


It would be a kindness if you could go to 
see her some day^ Nan. I will give you a 
card to one of the young ladies. What 
day could you go ? ” 

Next Saturday,” said Nan, still looking 
into the face of the little Russian. 

Stephen consulted a note-book in his 
pocket, then took out a card and wrote a 
name on it, saying, as he handed it to Nan, — 
That is the young lady in charge next 
Saturday ; ” and what Nan read was — Miss 
Margaret Eliot. 


CHAPTER IV. 


A LIGHT THROUGH PAUL’s WINDOW. — GIO- 
VANNI DISTINGUISHES HIMSELF. 

“ TF you are bound to go, Nan, I am going 
JL with you.” Lewis and Nan stood in 
the library, facing each other, and neither 
of them looking very well pleased with the 
situation. 

I promised Paul I would go, and a 
promise is a promise. There is n’t the 
slightest need of your going, Lewis. I can 
find my way, or I can go with Miss Eliot. 
If your mamma had n’t a headache, I would 
arrange it.” 

Well, one thing is certain, if you are 
bound to go, I am going with you.” 

But you have your fencing-lesson, and 
did n’t you say those fellows were coming 


NAN IN THE CITY. 73 

to arrange for the football game for next 
Saturday ? ” 

Well, so they were ; but I can send a mes- 
senger to them to postpone the meeting till 
this afternoon, for you are not going into 
that place alone. Nan Ratcliffe, if you can 
box.” 

Then I ’ll give it up ; though Paul will 
be so disappointed, I hate to,” said Nan, 
turning to put away her violin case, which 
she had brought out with the intention of 
keeping her promise to the little Russian. 

“ No, you shall not give it up, I ’ll go 
with you. I ’ll ring up a messenger and 
send a despatch to the boys, then we ’ll hurry 
off without disturbing mamma ; ” and suiting 
his action to his words, Lewis went to the 
little messenger call-box, and soon had his 
note to the captain of his football team on 
the way. Nan in the meantime again put 
her violin in place, and swung it over her 
shoulder, refusing Lewis’s aid in carrying it. 


74 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


^^You always swing it wrong, Lewis, 
thank you just the same. I hate to have 
you go.” 

Well, we won’t quarrel about it. Per- 
haps we ’d better leave a note for Lucille to 
give to mamma when she wakes up. I ’ll 
scratch one off : — 

‘‘ Mother dear, — Nan and I are off to the 
slums. Nan would have it that the Eussian 
grandmother would die if she did not get there 
to-day with her violin. I will bring her home all 
right by lunch-time. I shall take an umbrella 
and a fierce countenance, and Nan is wearing 
her touch-me-not air. Hope you will feel better 
by and by.” 

It was Saturday morning in Madison 
Street, and aside from the fact that a small 
number of the pawnshops in the vicinity 
were closed or pretended to be closed out of 
respect for the Jewish Sabbath, there were 
other noticeable differences in the air of 
Madison Street on Saturday morning. It 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


75 


was so-called cleaning-day, and in so far as 
the generous show of brooms and water 
could effect that result, the tenement houses 
in Madison Street were cleaner on Saturday 
mornings than on other days. Paul knew 
this, and he also knew that there were times 
when their janitress allowed certain domestic 
matters to interfere with the weekly washing 
of the halls and stairs. A drunken husband 
or a sick baby might seriously delay this 
good office, and Mrs. Flannigan had been 
known to let the friendly call of a talkative 
neighbor postpone indefinitely the periodical 
cleaning of the premises. Paul on this par- 
ticular Saturday morning wished to make 
sure that none of these obstacles stood in 
the way of having the noble entrance of No. 
600 Madison Street swept and garnished, for 
he had not forgotten the promise of the 
young lady to bring her violin and play to 
his grandmother. No. 600 Madison Street 
had, like many of its tenants and many 


76 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


of its neighbors, seen better days. In the 
good old days when New York society had 
courted the sea, No. 600 had been a resi- 
dence of noble proportions and fine adorn- 
ment. Anybody with a proper recognition 
of beauty could discern the high lineage of 
No. 600 by the fan-shaped semicircle over 
the front door, the inside blinds, which in 
their first estate had shone with the pur- 
est of white Florentine paint, the curving 
balustrade, and stuccoed cornices. How spa- 
cious those rooms had once been, only some 
very ancient ladies could tell, for within the 
memory of this and other generations they 
had been drawn and quartered to suit the 
vandal purposes of the landlord and the fast- 
growing population of the East Side. 

Too many people were eager to live in 
that salubrious neighborhood to allow any 
one family the luxury of one of those spa- 
cious rooms in No. 600 Madison Street, and 
so sometimes there were two families and 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


77 


sometimes there were four in the quon- 
dam drawing-room of the old New York 
mansion. 

Paul and his grandmother had a corner 
room, divided by a curtain, on the top of this 
great house, where lived ten other families. 
This little corner had perhaps in the good 
old days been a dressing-room for some 
young lady, but its one window looked out 
long, long ago over flowery fields and beyond 
to the East River, and now only by craning 
his neck could Paul even see the blue sky 
above, for high buildings reared their smoky 
heads behind, beside, and beyond. Still Paul 
liked to know there was a window which 
would open and let in a little air, even if it 
was not very fresh air, which after whirling 
above alleys and gutters quite full of un- 
pleasant rubbish came in to stir his curls. 
But the window itself was not a bad sort 
of window. It still kept those aristocratic 
blinds which belonged to better days, and 


78 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


there were some panes of glass left that were 
clear and good, though many had been broken 
and replaced by panes of a much cheaper 
kind. Paul spent a great deal of time in 
washing that window, and that Saturday 
morning he cleaned it very, very hard, and he 
had gone up and down stairs many times 
with water to make everything as clean as his 
little hands could scrub it, and it filled his 
little heart with sorrow to note that Mrs. 
Flannigan was very late in her Saturday 
morning work. Then Paul had an inspira- 
tion. Mrs. Flannigan’s baby had been very 
fretful of late ; perhaps if he should ofier to 
amuse her for an hour, the portress would 
be able to accomplish the task of removing 
the week’s dirt from the halls and stairs be- 
fore the arrival of his guests. Paul would 
have liked to confide to the portly janitress 
the great pleasure in store for his grand- 
mother, but on this point he had misgiv- 
ings. It was Mrs. Flannigan’ s husband who 


NAN IN THE CITT. 


79 


vowed to drive all them snobs out of the 
neighborhood, and them fine ladies too. It 
was none of they’s business how much beer 
a man drank, nor how many clothes his 
wife had, nor what his babies had to eat, 
and if they come nosing round my prem- 
ises I ’ll see to it they don’t come but 
onct.” 

In spite of Mike Flannigan, the little 
Flannigans were cared for every day at the 
Kindergarten, but his wife held her tongue 
about that. Still Paul thought it wise to 
say nothing about the prospects of guests 
this morning, but only to peep quietly into 
the basement window, to discover if it were 
the baby or Mike, and his heart grew lighter 
when he saw the janitress rocking the teeth- 
ing baby to and fro. 

Please, Mrs. Flannigan, if I ’ll take the 
baby up to my window, she ’ll be good for a 
while ! ” ^ 

That ’s a good boy, for she ’s that fretful 


80 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


I can do nothin at all, and Mike himself 
loafing the streets this day.” 

A queer little pain seized Paul’s heart, 
and he put both hands on the brawny arms 
of the big Irishwoman, and, looking up into 
her face with his sad brown eyes, said, — 

Oh, she is coming to-day, Mrs. Flannigan, 
the girl with the fiddle. Mike would n’t 
hurt her, would he ? ” 

The Lord knows what he ’d do, he ’s 
that ugly. Is it a real lady she is ? ” 

Just a real lady ! only a girl \^ith a fid- 
dle. She will make Russian music for 
grannie.” 

Fiddlin’ for the old lady, is it ? Maybe 
she ’ll come when Mike ’s not about. It ’s 
me must be washing them halls if real ladies 
is coming. Be she a Settlement girl ? It ’s 
them Mike can’t abide the sight of.” 

Leaving the fretful baby to Paul’s tender 
care, Mrs. Flannigan was mounting the 
stone basement steps to the street, a wooden 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


81 


pail of water with a scant sprinkling of soap 
in one hand, and a broom in the other. 

She had reached the sidewalk and paused, 
with her customary interest in the affairs of 
the great world of Madison Street, to observe 
the passing crowd. 

There 's that Mike now, and them good- 
for-nothing Murphies, — as sure ’s my name 
is Bridget Flannigan there ’s Paul’s young 
lady with the fiddle and a fine dandy of a 
young gent. How ’ll Mike like to see them 
walking up the steps of No. 600 ? ” 

Mike had seen them coming and, being in 
that state of fight induced by spending a 
morning in a saloon, he stepped out from his 
position against a lamp-post, and blocked 
the passage of Nan and Lewis by saying, — 

Where you goin’, my fine dude and miss ? 
— no place this for dudes.” 

Step aside and let us pass,” said Lewis, 
putting out his hand and pushing the man 
back so that Nan should have a free passage. 

6 


84 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


and it was but a second before he was on the 
scene of action, jerking Mike Flannigan by 
the broad shoulders away from his victim, 
not without a protest from Mike. And it ’s 
you, Mr. Parson, that ’s down on the saloons, 
is it? Just wait till I get a hold of you ! ” 

Nan, not wanting in courage, but instinc- 
tively shrinking from the unpleasant publicity 
of this encounter and really afraid she might 
lose her violin, was about to yield to Mrs. 
Flannigan’ s invitation to share the basement 
hospitality, when a new element presented 
itself in the figure of Giovanni flying down 
Madison Street, waving a huge stick and fol- 
lowed by one of New York’s grenadier police- 
men. It was not plain to Nan whether the 
policeman was in pursuit of Giovanni or not, 
but it was quite apparent that the Italian 
wished to be in the midst of the fight. 

Seeing the Irishman beginning an attack 
upon Harold, Giovanni brought his stick 
down on the assailant’s head; but he had no 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


85 


sooner dealt this valiant blow for the defence of 
his friend than he felt the grip of the officer 
of the law on his shoulder, while the Irish- 
man had an equally surprising sensation. 

How now, what is this ? ” said the officer ; 
has the fellow attacked you, Mr. Ratcliff e ? 
for Harold was well known. 

Hal called Lewis to explain the situation, 
and Giovanni in his mongrel language ex- 
plained that Mrs. Prince had sent him fast, 
very fast, to find the young lady and the 
young gentleman and so he come quick — 
he run most of ze way, and when he see big 
fight, he tought dey kill Master Lewis ! 

So the terrified Italian, on the testimony 
to his good character given by Harold, was 
released, and Mike carried off to a quiet 
Sunday in jail, while Nan said somewhat 
wofully, after much more parley and explana- 
tions, And now for Paul.” 

Oh, it was Paul you were looking for. 
Nan. I think you ’ll hardly go slumming 


86 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


again without an escort, but such a thing 
does n’t happen once in six months. I ’ll go 
up with you to Paul’s room. Giovanni can 
go to the Club-room and wait a few minutes ; 
later I will telephone to Mrs. Prince, who is 
evidently anxious.” 

The next day, after the exciting scenes had 
been rehearsed for the amusement of the little 
boys and the discomfiture of Mrs. Prince, 
Nan wrote to her mother as follows : — 

My dear Mamma, — Such a strange thing has 
happened, the kind of thing that you never would 
expect would happen to me, and now at last I can 
repay the dear old Count for all he has done for 
me. We thought we must telegraph, but then it 
seemed better to write the astonishing news that 
we think we have found the Count’s little boy and 
his poor x^ld mother ! It all came out of Harold’s 
Settlement Club. I wrote you about our going 
there and of the poor little Eussian lad who begged 
me to come and play to him. Well, yesterday 
Lewis and I went over. We had a little adven- 
ture too of our own, but that does n’t count a bit 
just here. We went through queer streets till we 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


87 


found the number Paul had given us, and just 
before that we met Cousin Hal and he took us 
up the dark staircases to Paul's poor little home. 
He was sitting there, mammy dear, looking, oh, so 
wistfully, out of one window, the only window he 
has, and seeing nothing but black, dirty old build- 
ings, and looking as though he wished he could see 
my dear old hills. But he shall, bless the boy ! 
soon. Well, his poor old grandmother is dying, 
and she was in bed, quite feeble and old. She 
wanted me to play for her because Paul told her 
I knew some Kussian airs. I played my “ Schone 
Minka ” and the “ Ked Sarafan ! ” Oh, dear me, 
mother, she was nearly wild over it, and I could n’t 
understand a word she jabbered in Kussian. But 
Paul told us. She knew that her son must have 
taught me that air, for nobody else ever played it 
like that. Then Harold asked Paul who his father 
was, and why his grandmother felt so badly about 
the music. Then Paul told us that his father had 
to escape from Kussia because he was suspected of 
having something to do with some socialist so- 
cieties, and he had left Paul with his mother, who 
soon died, and then the old grandmother had 
taken all the money she could get, but the Czar 
had taken most of their estates, and she came to 


86 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


again without an escort, but such a thing 
does n’t happen once in six months. I ’ll go 
up with you to Paul’s room. Giovanni can 
go to the Club-room and wait a few minutes ; 
later I will telephone to Mrs. Prince, who is 
evidently anxious.” 

The next day, after the exciting scenes had 
been rehearsed for the amusement of the little 
boys and the discomfiture of Mrs. Prince, 
Nan wrote to her mother as follows : — 

My dear Mamma, — Such a strange thing has 
happened, the kind of thing that you never would 
expect would happen to me, and now at last I can 
repay the dear old Count for all he has done for 
me. We thought we must telegraph, hut then it 
seemed better to write the astonishing news that 
we think we have found the Count’s little boy and 
his poor old mother ! It all came out of Harold’s 
Settlement Club. I wrote you about our going 
there and of the poor little Eussian lad who begged 
me to come and play to him. Well, yesterday 
Lewis and I went over. We had a little adven- 
ture too of our own, but that does n’t count a bit 
just here. We went through queer streets till we 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


87 


found the number Paul had given us, and just 
before that we met Cousin Hal and he took us 
up the dark staircases to Paul s poor little home. 
He was sitting there, mammy dear, looking, oh, so 
wistfully, out of one window, the only window he 
has, and seeing nothing but black, dirty old build- 
ings, and looking as though he wished he could see 
my dear old hills. But he shall, bless the boy ! 
soon. Well, his poor old grandmother is dying, 
and she was in bed, quite feeble and old. She 
wanted me to play for her because Paul told her 
I knew some Kussian airs. I played my “ Schone 
Minka ” and the “ Red Sarafan ! ” Oh, dear me, 
mother, she was nearly wild over it, and I could n’t 
understand a word she jabbered in Russian. But 
Paul told us. She knew that her son must have 
taught me that air, for nobody else ever played it 
like that. Then Harold asked Paul who his father 
was, and why his grandmother felt so badly about 
the music. Then Paul told us that his father had 
to escape from Russia because he was suspected of 
having something to do with some socialist so- 
cieties, and he had left Paul with his mother, who 
soon died, and then the old grandmother had 
taken all the money she could get, but the Czar 
had taken most of their estates, and she came to 


88 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


America, and they had been all over the country, 
to Chicago and San Francisco, wherever they heard 
of Eussians, looking for his father, and at last had 
spent almost all of their money and had found 
themselves obliged to live in poorer quarters all 
the time till they had come at last to these slums 
where Harold lived. They knew so little English, 
and the old woman is so feeble, everybody cheated 
them. Then Harold thought how much Ludovisky 
was like Lodoff, and how much Paul looked like 
our Count, and now we are perfectly sure it is his 
own little boy. And Harold is writing all this to 
the Count to-day, and we can hardly wait till we 
hear whether the Count did have a little boy, and 
if he did n’t, if Paul is n’t his little boy at all, 
won’t he take him when his grandmother dies, 
for she can’t live very long, and let him have a 
good look at the hills and the blue sky, and a 
window that looks somewhere, and somebody to 
talk Eussian with ? 

Oh, mamma, does n’t it seem to be too good to 
be true, and a real fairy tale ? Do have papa 
start the Count off as soon as he can, for Lewis 
and I can hardly wait for the end. 

Your loving 


Nan. 


CHAPTER V. 


THE END OF THE FAIRY TALE. 

r I TELEGRAMS, telegrams ! My ! won’t 
A old Jasper writhe ? ” said Lewis, look- 
ing at half a dozen yellow envelopes en- 
closing messages sent from Chicopee within 
two days. 

Our poor old station-master ! Do you 
remember last year, when Marshall’s team 
won the football game, Jasper flatly refused 
to send our telegrams of congratulations ? ” 
said Nan. When we were all dancing with 
delight over the news, he said, ^ Ain’t going to 
send no sich tomfoolnonsense over these yere 
wires so long as I has the handling of them.’ ” 
Yes, and you had to drive five miles to 
Buckfield to get the message off,” said Lewis. 

He ’s a queer chap.” 


90 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


But tlie funniest and what nearly be- 
came the sorriest mistake was/’ Nan con- 
tinued, when old Squire Harris was dying 
and he wanted to see his niece once more. 
She was his favorite niece, but had become 
a Sister of Charity, and the Squire was so 
angry over it that he wouldn’t have any- 
thing to do with her. But when he was 
dying they sent a message to New York to 
^ Sister Agnes, Trinity Mission.’ Old Jas- 
per looked at it and said, ^ Squire ain’t got 
no sister Agnes, must be his wife’s sister, 
and they ’s that crazy they forgot the hind 
name. His wife was a Scott of Burlington. 
Now I ’ll fix that into something like Miss 
Agnes Scott, Trinity Mission.” ’ It found 
Sister Agnes, but it was a wonder it did. 
Jasper thinks it is awfully e?:travagant to 
telegraph even if he does come in for 
part of the money, and when the boys 
telegraph to papa about their coming up 
in the summer, he storms and rages. What 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


91 


will lie make of these ? Here is the first 
one, — 

“ ‘ Letter received. Count overcome. How old 
is the boy V • ' 

“ Second one. ‘ How long can the woman live ? 
Count will come.’ 

“ Third one. ‘ It is the Count’s son. Get doctor 
for mother.’ 

“ Fourth. ‘ Count will start to-morrow. Move 
mother to good quarters if possible.’ 

“ Fifth. ‘ Count started. Telegraph to Boston 
if the mother should die.’ 

“ Sixth. ‘ Hospital for the mother, yes. Take 
boy to Mrs. Prince’s.’ ” 

And ours must be as interesting to old 
Jasper as these were/’ said Lewis, taking up 
a memorandum, — 

“ ‘ Paul is eleven years old.’ 

"‘The grandmother might live a week or a 
month if in good quarters.’ 

“ ‘ Doctor advises hospital.’ 

" ‘ Everything done as desired. Paul will remain 
here.’ ” 


92 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


The house had been quivering with ex- 
citement for the past three days, ever since 
that Saturday escapade in Madison Street, 
and now it was Tuesday ’afternoon. Mrs. 
Prince had already started for New York to 
meet the Count in her carriage, and in an- 
other hour they would arrive at the house. 

Nan and Lewis were in a state of agi- 
tation which bordered on hysterics. Lewis 
had paced up and down the halls, pounded 
the piano, and teased his dog. Nan had 
tied knots in her handkerchief, drank a 
dozen glasses of water, and explored every 
corner of the house in vain search for one 
more article to add to the comfort of the 
Count’s apartments. Trying to recall the vari- 
ous appointments of the Hermitage, she had 
brought every kind of a bachelor luxury into 
use, from shaving-glass to ash-tray and pipes, 
and finally crowned her acts of devotion by 
laying her violin on the altar of affection. 
She could think of nothing else, and so she 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


93 


and Lewis had met in the library to langh 
and sport when they both felt like crying. 
It seemed strange that of all the household 
the one least disturbed by the anticipated 
arrival was the one most nearly affected. 
Paul, taken from the forlorn place he had 
called home in Madison Street, and made, 
for the time being, thoroughly at home by 
the little Prince boys, seemed calm and un- 
perturbed. Harry and Wolcott had taken 
possession of him, and each vied with the 
other in arousing the interest of their 
guest in his treasures. Steamships that 
would go, railroad trains that would col- 
lide, horses that would neigh and donkeys 
that would bray, all passed before the little 
stranger’s eyes, and were like things in a 
dream. Paul neither laughed nor cried ; he 
handled the boys’ playthings and put them 
down, and they in a measure excited his 
boyish interest, but he was hardly more than 
half awake to the pleasant things about him. 


94 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


and was but dimly conscious that in a short 
time he should see his father. The fact 
that his grandmother had been separated 
from him filled his little heart to the ex- 
elusion of everything else. They,” the 
pretty nurses in the Settlement, had told 
him that she would be taken care of in the 
hospital, and that soon he should go to see 
her. Paul had suffered so much; the little 
fellow had had so much trouble that one 
more seemed only inevitable, but if he were n’t 
such a big boy, he would like to keep close 
to the girl Nan,” whose eyes were so 
friendly and kind. He had n’t had much of 
a chance at playthings, and there were so 
many things in his life that had been any- 
thing hut play. The recollection of a good 
dinner and a good breakfast, and a room 
with three clear windows out of which he 
could see trees and sky, Avas the most vividly 
pleasant part of his present experience, and, 
sitting on the floor in Harry’s room, watch- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


95 


ing the wheels of Harry’s Great Eastern ” 
go round, his little heart began to long for 
that friendly girl ; and when Harry and Wol- 
cott went in search of greater wonders, Paul 
leaped to his feet and made his way to the 
staircase, and, following the sound of voices 
below, groped blindly for the light of that 
kind face he had begun to love. And it was 
Nan who met the wistful little lad half-way. 
A glance at Lewis said volumes, and Lewis, 
knowing how the little boys always liked 
to have Nan to themselves, vanished with 
great speed ; and Paul, seeing something in 
that kind face which opened his heart, put 
his little hands beseechingly together with 
the mute gesture of the foreigner, and whis- 
pered, I want to see my grandmother.” 

Oh, Paul dear,” said Nan, taking the 
boy's thin hands in her strong ones, you 
shall see her this very afternoon, but in a 
very few minutes you will see your good 
father. You think you do not remember 


96 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


him, Paul dear, but I know you will soon 
love him and he will love you. He is my 
friend, you know, Paul, and he taught me 
to play the violin, and by and by he will 
take you to his house, and you will see 
mountains all covered with snow, and in 
the summer time such woods, and my lake 
— my home. You love the woods and the 
birds, and you will grow big and strong, Paul, 
and my own little brother Robbie will be 
your playmate. You will like Robbie, Paul, 
and he will like you, and I shall be happy 
to think that he has a playmate now that 
I am here. Won’t that be fine, Paul? 
Now you will be glad to see your papa, 
Paul dear, for it is so long since he has had 
his little boy and — Hark ! that is the 
carriage ; shall we open the door ? ” 

And it so happened that the very first 
one to meet the Count was Nan standing at 
the open door with Paul’s hand in hers. 

To speak Russian, to hear once more 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


97 


the words of home, — Paul could not long 
remain indifferent to that unspeakable bliss. 
Soon the child’s lips were unsealed, and 
an hour later all fears of this new-found 
parent had fled from Paul’s heart, and, seated 
on his father’s knee, he poured out in long- 
pent-up language the story of their wan- 
derings. 

To think,” said the Count, that I 
in my safe refuge had no knowledge of 
this ! When I was landed here first, I wished 
to avoid my compatriots. I had many ene- 
mies among the Nihilists, for I am not and 
never was a Nihilist, and I sought and 
found that secluded spot, my Paradise, in 
New Hampshire. It would have been un- 
safe for me to try to communicate with my 
friends in Russia, but I counted upon being 
forgotten, and then to return and find my 
wife, my boy, and my mother.” 

Shall we not go to see her now, my 
dear Count?” said Mrs. Prince. You will 


7 


98 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


find her very feeble, and the joy of seeing 
you will be very great.” 

Come, let us go to see grandmamma,” 
said Paul, tugging at his father’s hand ; and 
soon they were on their way to the hospital. 

A week later Nan read this letter from 
Chicopee : — 

My dear little Girl, — I can hardly tell you 
with what joy we received the dear old Count 
and his little boy on Tuesday. Of course the 
Count feels very badly over the death of his 
mother, but she could hardly have rallied from 
the shock and surprise of seeing him. The 
little boy is devoted to him, and we are all so 
pleased with him. He and Eohhie are already 
great friends ; and the Count has promised to close 
up the Hermitage earlier than usual this fall, and 
come to us next week, and he and Paul and Ivan 
will fill in part the place left empty by our dear 
daughters. The little boy found some photo- 
graphs of you in my room, and kissed them rev- 
erently as if you were a saint. It gave me quite 
a new idea of my wild Nan, and perhaps you 
have found a mission we never dreamed for you, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


99 


by bringing the spirit of your happy, healthy self 
into those distorted city lives. May all your 
work be as fruitful of good as this has been, dear ! 
although this seems hke a miracle. 

Good-night, little daughter. Marian sends her 
love and asks for a letter. She is very happy in 
her home, and Herbert’s wound is quite well 
once more. 

Lovingly, Mother. 

And Nan did not sleep before writing to 
her little brother at Chicopee : — 

My dear Bobbie, — Heigho! How I would 
just like to take a run up to Chicopee to-day to 
see how you and Paul are getting along ! Now, 
Bobby dear, do you remember the story Marian 
used to read to us about the little Prince who did 
not know how to laugh, because the spiteful old 
fairy that was n’t invited to his christening had 
cast some evil spell over him ? And then when 
they tried all the doctors and all the old wise 
women to find some way to make him laugh, 
somebody said, Take him to Mother Earth. Then 
do you remember they took him down to the 
brook in the moonlight, and there he saw the 
man in the moon sailing by, and the old cow 


100 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


looked into the brook and saw the moon too, and 
jumped over it, — over the brook of course, — “ and 
the little dog laughed to see such sport, and the 
dish ran away with the spoon,” and then the little 
Prince began to laugh, and he laughed and he 
laughed, till everybody thought he was daft. 

Well, now, Bobby dear, Paul is very much like 
that sad little Prince, and if I could only go home 
for a while, I should just give my time to making 
him laugh. But as I must stay here and study 
and study, I want you to do all you can to make 
him laugh. Don’t you think he would like to tie 
the old peacock fly-brush about his waist and 
strut around the hen-yard, and call on Mrs, Brah- 
mapootra and Mr. Cochin China, and see Lady 
Priscilla gather her Plymouth Kockets under her 
wing ? or perhaps if he does n’t think that any 
fun, try him with rubber boots and the big 
puddle in the meadow. How I wish I could try 
it myself — splash — splash — oh, what fun ! 
And oh, Eobbie, don’t get discouraged! If all 
these fail, there are the autumn leaves. Just 
make up the biggest pile you can on the side of 
the hill and show him how to roll over them. But 
first of all, Bobbins, you must see that he has all 
the best things to eat, — milk toast, and griddle- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


101 


cakes, and his pockets full of apples and chestnuts ; 
and if he does n’t learn to laugh then, well, I 
shall have to bring Jill up to dance hornpipes for 
him and make jokes. Jill, Bobinet, is my school- 
girl friend. She is the drollest girl in the world, 
but as clever as can be, with all her nonsense. 
She is going to Camp Chicopee next summer, and 
then we shall laugh all the time. Oh, Eobbie, I 
wish I were as rich as — as Mrs. Prince, I would 
buy a whole island on our lake and take ever so 
many boys and girls from the city up there every 
summer, and show them what it means to he 
strong and well, to have sky and mountains and 
water instead of brick buildings and sidewalks 
and poor backs and weak eyes. 

It is my castle in Spain now, Bobbie, to give 
some of the poor sick children a bit of our lake, 
just as it was papa’s to bring the rich city boys to 
Camp Chicopee. But I must study and work, 
and you must be good to Paul and make him 
laugh. 

Good-by, dear Bobkins. 

Your old Nan. 


CHAPTER VI. 


A DAY AT SCHOOL AND A FOOTBALL GAME. 



ET Nan Ratcliff e see it ? ” 


-L' Nan, Nansie, Anna Ratcliffe ! ’’ 

Of course it was Jill’s teasing voice which 
greeted Nan’s ears, as she entered the sewing- 
room, where a dozen girls stood about one 
object of admiration, — a hat, just finished 
by Gertrude Sands. Nan, who had been 
called from the laboratory, where she had 
assisted at an interesting chemical experi- 
ment, which she had enjoyed with an inten- 
sity born of a scientific nature, brought to 
the millinery department some regret, which 
was not easily to be thawed into enthusiasm, 
even by so marvellous a structure as Ger- 
trude’s hat ; but Jill would not allow her to 
regard it indifferently. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


103 


It was truly a masterpiece, and Nan was 
the single girl in Division B who did not 
envy Gertrude the possession and creation 
of it. 

That would just suit you, Nan ; try it on,” 
said Gertrude. Only you ought to put your 
hair up in a tight knot, and you would look 
ever so stylish.” 

A hat ! I am the last person to know 
anything about a hat. My idea of a hat is 
an Alpine in winter, and a sailor in summer ; 
and as for doing my hair up, humph ! 
no hairpins, thank you, for me for a good 
long time yet. All my fun would be gone 
if I had to bother about such things. Oh, 
girls, did you know the Poly boys are to 
play the Pratts next Saturday ? ” 

There, Nan, just try it on, and you 
can trim one yourself to wear to the game,” 
said Gertrude, insisting on Nan’s placing the 
top-heavy hat on her head. There, girls, 
does n’t she look stylish ? ” 


104 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


It is ever so pretty and stylish, Gertrude, 
but your style, not mine,” said Nan, taking off 
the hat and turning it around with a careful 
survey of knots, bows, wings, etc. 

That ’s so. Nan, — it is n’t your style,” 
said Jill, whose admiration for Nan’s inde- 
pendence and force increased daily. ^^But 
what will you do when it is your turn to 
trim, as it will be next week, — for if you 
insist upon having no trimmings on your 
hats, you ’ll have to trim for some one else.” 

Oh, yes, I have a customer for my first 
hat, though she may back out when she sees 
the hat,” said Nan, not telling the girls that 
her first customer was Mrs. Prince’s parlor- 
maid. 

By this time the girls had seated themselves 
for work, and after a few designs were 
handed around, some cotton flannel strips 
were distributed with which the girls prac- 
tised the mysteries of making rosettes and 
tying bows. A few had models well ad- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


105 


vanced in cotton flannel trimming, and some 
were working upon real silk and velvet, their 
own materials. 

My bows remind me of a cotton flannel 
Bunny I used to play with when I was a 
child,’’ said Nan, pulling up the ears of her 
pink cotton flannel bows with increasing 
dexterity, but not much enthusiasm, although 
the fact that her prospective hat trimming 
was for Polly the parlor-maid lent some zeal 
to her practice. 

I wonder if Polly likes Alsatians or 
ears,” thought Nan. Then she asked aloud 
of the teacher, — 

^^Are Alsatian bows hard to make, Mrs. 
Mitchell ? ” 

Alsatian bows are all out, you are way 
behind. Loops and big ruchy things are the 
style, and end bows like these,” said Jill, 
giving a touch to her cotton flannel that 
transformed the whole to an animated 
fashion plate. 


106 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


You have a real touchy Miss Brinker- 
hofE,” said the teacher. 

So glad, — I have been looking for a 
vocation for some time. I had set my heart 
on being a Lilliputian fairy, but my family 
don't consider it a respectable calling. Do 
you think I could be a head milliner ? No 
pun, girls, 'pon honor.” 

You could never be anything but a head 
milliner, my dear ; you are too saucy for a 
subordinate,” said Mrs. Mitchell. 

There 's always room at the top,” said 
Jill, shaking her absurd little round head 
saucily. 

If you can't go ahead, you can go afoot. 
You can always dance, Jill,” said Gertrude. 

Those who dance must pay the fiddler. 
My hats shall pay the fiddlers.” 

Whose designs are these ? ” said Mrs. 
Mitchell, taking up some drawings which 
lay on the table. 

Those are some things of mine,” said 


NAN IN THE CITY. 107 

Jill, with a demure modesty quite unlike her 
manner of a moment before. 

Those are really very good, Jill,” said 
the teacher. ^^They have quite a striking 
originality. We will use two of these for 
our models next week.’’ 

Good, Jill ! did n’t I tell you so ? ” whis- 
pered Nan, at the same time patting Jill’s 
brown head. 

I did n’t think they were good for any- 
thing,” said Jill. 

They are the best we have had this 
month,” said Mrs. Mitchell, putting them 
in her drawer with the impress of her 
Good ” on them. 

Jill was as still as a church mouse after 
that, and worked in a painstaking way 
through the hour till the gong sounded the 
noon recess, when, as it were in a second, 
every student in the Technical Department 
seemed to swarm the corridors, luncheon in 
hand and tongues unloosed, — girls in ♦twos 


108 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


and threes together, boys in larger groups. 
A few made haste to eat a sandwich or an 
apple, then bounded out of the building to 
the tennis ground across the street. Among 
these were Jill and Nan, who were challenged 
by two of the boy students to a set at tennis. 

Nan could not endure the long confinement 
without some fresh air, and the chance to 
escape from the building brought a glow to 
her cheeks. A few of the boys she knew 
slightly in the class-rooms, but they all had 
an admiration for the cool-headed calm girl 
from New Hampshire, and a few of them had 
watched her at tennis, and once in a while 
broke up the girls’ set by challenging Nan to 
a game. 

We are going to play the Polytechnics at 
football next Saturday, Miss Ratclife,” said 
Vaughn Brown. It’ll be a great game. I 
suppose our fellows will lose, but it ’s some- 
thing for them to play with us.” 

“ I am glad you are going to try,” said 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


109 


Nan, “ but I don’t believe you ’ll win. I 
have a friend on the Poly team, and he. says 
it ’s the best eleven they ever had.” 

Will you go out to see it ? ” 

Oh, yes, I expect to.” 

Then they began to bat. Fifteen, forty-five. 
Vantage game. Love all, — chiming the mystic 
rhythmic counts of the game of tennis. 

There was something about Vaughn that 
Nan liked. She always struck “ straight out 
from the shoulders,” as the boys said, at a 
fellow’s best points. Vaughn had a fine, 
honest face, though of humble origin. He 
was by education and antecedents entirely 
unlike the boys whom she knew best. He 
was not one of the boys of the slums whom 
she could offer to help, neither was he one 
of her friends like Marshall or Lewis. He 
happened to sit near her in the class-room, 
and had occasionally picked up her book and 
once sharpened her pencils, but without any 
show of gallantry or fiirtation, such as marked 


110 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


the behavior of some of the boys to the other 
girls. He was marvellously quick at mathe- 
matics, and accurate in the chemical labora- 
tory, but in literature and history his reci- 
tations were dull and without appreciation ; 
yet he was a hard worker, and stood out 
signally among the boys as a leader in the 
class-room and at sports. Even Nan, un- 
accustomed as she was to school work, could 
see that the girls were the best students in 
the highest courses, but in the work-rooms 
the boys brought something to bear upon 
their task that the girls had not. The boys 
had elected Vaughn Brown their captain on 
the football team, and Nan could not help 
observing him very closely as they played 
their game, thinking of the team of well- 
trained players they were to meet next 
Saturday ; for Nan would not have been Nan 

“ If in the fall 
Her young girl’s fancy 
Did not turn to thoughts of ball.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Ill 


She and Lewis had made a careful survey 
of the teams that would come into the field 
in November, and it would have been hard 
indeed to find either of them wanting in 
accurate knowledge of the make-up of all 
the great school and college teams, — from 
Princeton, which was distinguished for Nan 
by Marshall’s being a member, and Yale, 
which Princeton must beat, to Columbia, 
and the younger boys of the preparatory 
schools against which Lewis’s team might be 
called to try their novice skill. To Prince- 
ton’s game they all looked as the Mecca of 
their autumn hopes. It was the date to and 
from which everything was counted. On 
that day the Chicopee boys within reach 
would mount the famous Chicopee tally-ho, 
and, winding the horn through avenues and 
boulevards, drive out to join the great crowd 
at the polo ground. But that great day was 
still several weeks ahead, and the smaller 
games were only anticipatory of the great 


112 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


occasion. Second to Marshall’s Princeton 
game, Lewis’s Poly game against the Pratt 
team seemed of most importance to Nan. 
It was not strange, then, that Vaughn Brown 
as his antagonist should claim more than a 
passing notice from Nan, but that they 
would have anything more than a general 
encounter she would not have dreamed. Yet 
when the eventful day arrived and she with 
a score or more girls and several teachers 
found themselves close to the field at the 
great park. Nan found her interest more than 
centred in those two boys. Jill, of course, 
eagerly scanning the field, followed Nan’s 
eyes to the entrance of the Polytechnic team, 
and only through Nan’s eyes saw anything 
but madness in their surging movements. 

They look like blond buffaloes,” said 
Jill. Why do they wear such long hair ? ” 
Nan looked down at her small companion 
with a glance of surprise. To think that Jill 
with all her cleverness should know so little 


NAN IN TNE CITY. 


113 


of football as to ask such an absurd question ! 
But Jill was so evidently asking for informa- 
tion that Nan answered, — 

Why, to save their heads from being 
cracked, I suppose.’’ 

I don’t think that will make any differ- 
ence,” said Jill. 

The game moved on with spirit and about 
equal success, full of minute interest for Nan, 
who had never seen a real match game before. 
She found her sympathies strangely vacillat- 
ing between her own team and Lewis’s eleven. 
Suddenly she saw Lewis seize the ball and 
make a bold rush through the Pratt’s rush 
line. He had nearly skirted the field and 
was directly opposite their position, when 
out dashed Vaughn Brown, seized Lewis, and 
threw him beyond the bounds, thus prevent- 
ing his touchdown. Lewis threw up his 
hands and cried to the referee, — 

Foul — it was a foul — he tackled me 
below the waist.” 


8 


114 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


^^1 did not/’ said Vaughn, his honest face 
flushing crimson at the suggestion ; then 
turning towards the fence where Nan stood, 
pale and sorrowful, with the words on her 
lips, Oh, Lewis, it was not a foul.” But 
Lewis saw nothing. 

‘‘You did, you cad, and you lie.” 

Lewis’s voice rang out clear and throb- 
bing with passion. Vaughn started as if 
Lewis’s charge had cut him keenly. His 
hands clenched ; he shut his mouth firmly, 
and took a quick step towards Lewus, who 
stood with his head up and darting angry 
looks at him. 

“ Row, row ! ” shouted some excited 
youngsters standing near ; but their voices 
brought Vaughn to a realizing sense of the 
situation. He drew a long breath and then 
said in a low voice, — 

“ Prince, you know I did not tackle you 
below the waist. I think that you ought to 
apologize.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


115 


Lewis stared at Vaughn, and then a flush 
came over his face. He acted as if he were 
going to speak, when the game was renewed. 
From now on imtil the end of the first half 
of the game it seemed to Nan that Lewis 
did not play with his usual snap, and she 
wondered if his heart accused him of his 
conduct to Vaughn. In a few minutes the 
first three quarters was over; and as the 
players ran from the field. Nan's heart gave 
a glad leap when she saw Lewis coming 
quickly towards Vaughn, who was standing 
near her throwing on his great-coat. 

Brown,” said Lewis, with evident effort, 
I — I believe I do owe you an apology ; at 
least — at least,” he stammered, for the 
language I used.” 

I will at least admit you do,” replied 
Vaughn, in a quiet tone of voice and with 
rather a look of contempt in his eye, as he 
turned away, apparently without noticing the 
feeble movement Lewis made as if to offer 
his hand. 


116 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Nan’s heart sank. Her spirits drooped, 
and when the game was resumed she watched 
the play with dull interest. Lewis, on the 
contrary, went into the game with mad 
energy. Again and again he made a dash- 
ing run with the ball that brought out cheers 
from the Poly boys. He battered at the 
Pratt rush line as if he had no sense of 
danger to himself or his opponents. Vaughn 
played with characteristic, cool determination, 
and inspired his side to stand firm. But 
the Poly boys were too strong for them, 
and before long the Pratt boys were steadily 
pushed down the field, until Lewis was 
shoved over their line for a touchdown. 
Then he kicked a pretty goal, and a few 
minutes later, when the game was over, he 
was carried ofi the field in triumph by his 
cheering schoolmates. 

But there was one who did not con- 
gratulate Lewis, and that was Nan. He knew 
she had heard him accuse Vaughn falsely, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


117 


and he did not enjoy his triumph, though 
he pretended to. Nan quickly slipped away 
from the field and the teachers and Jill, who 
was effervescing with good spirits. She had 
seen only the comic side of the game, and as 
she had friends on the Poly eleven she did 
not take the defeat of her own team much 
to heart. 

Oh, Nan, don’t you think Lewis just 
played a splendid game ? Are n t you proud 
of him?” 

But Nan gave Jill a sorrowful look, which 
caused her to exclaim, “ Why, what ’s the 
matter, Nan?” 

Nan made no reply, but, nodding to Jill, 
slipped out of the car and was soon in her 
room, where she threw herself on her bed 
and cried as though her heart would break. 
But when she heard Lewis come into his 
room a few moments later and pitch his 
things around as if out of sorts with himself 
in spite of his fine victory, she rose, dried 


118 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


her eyes, and began to play her violin, re- 
solved that Lewis should know nothing of 
her grief. Lewis soon finished his dressing, 
and went down stairs just as his mother and 
the little boys, who had gone in the carriage, 
arrived home from the field. 

Say, Lewis, what did you get mad 
about?” asked Wolcott. 

Mrs. Prince said nothing. She had gath- 
ered enough from what she had just heard 
about Lewis's affair with Vaughn Brown to 
see that her son had behaved in an un- 
gentlemanly manner. Lewis affected to 
make light of Wolcott’s question, but just 
as Nan came down stairs there was a ring 
at the door-bell, and as Lewis happened to 
be at the door with his hand on the knob, 
he opened it. There stood Vaughn Brown. 
Lewis stiffened and flushed. Vaughn was 
visibly embarrassed, and did not appear to 
see anybody but Lewis. But he gathered 
himself together instantly, and said, — 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


119 


“ Lewis, I owe you an apology for cutting 
you short when you were going to say the 
right thing.’’ 

The boys faced each other rather awk- 
wardly a second, and then Lewis, after red- 
dening and shuffling uneasily, broke into a 
hah laugh, — 

That ’s all right, Vaughn. I did n’t mean 
what I said. I was excited and — ” 

I ’ll tell you how it happened, Lewis,” 
Vaughn broke in eagerly. You saw Jim 
Melrose coming after you, and I surprised 
you when 1 tackled you. Of course you 
would not have done it if it had n’t been unex- 
pected. That is my tackle. Football makes 
you say lots of queer things. Don’t you 
remember how Fatty Mason yelled, when we 
downed him, ‘ You ’ve broken my hair ’ ? ” 
The two boys laughed heartily over this, 
and Lewis said, — 

Look here, Vaughn, that ’s a flimsy joke 
of yours to help me out of a bad scrape \ but 


120 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


it shows you are a good fellow, and I owe 
you thanks besides the apology.'^ 

Vaughn instantly put out his hand, which 
Lewis grasped, and they shook hands warmly 
and to their evident relief. 

“ Won't you come in, Vaughn ? ” asked 
Nan, beaming on both boys. Vaughn came 
in and talked over the game with good 
humor, giving Lewis’s side full credit for 
good playing. Then Lewis experienced the 
real pleasure of his victory^ and found he 
had made a new friend in an unexpected 
quarter. 


CHAPTER VII. 


NAN TRIES TO LIFT THE CURTAIN OF THE 
FUTURE. 

HALL we go to see Daisy to-day?” 



O Mrs. Prince asked at breakfast one 
Saturday, as the holiday programme was 
being planned. 

The boys exclaimed eagerly, Oh, yes, 
mamma; let's go to see Daisy this morn- 


ing. 


Not you boys to-day, only Nan. Daisy 
has been ill, and the confusion of seeing so 
many would be too much for her. But you 
may all send her something. Wolcott shall 
get some flowers from the conservatory, 
Harry get all the illustrated magazines 
together, and, Lewis, what have you to 


send ? ” 


122 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Oh, I bought some color tubes last night 
with the last of my allowance, thinking you 
would take us over to-day.” 

That was generous of you, dear, and 
just what she will need when she can use 
her hands again, for she has lots of Christ- 
mas orders, and in spite of my protests wants 
to fill them.” 

Nan had soon found that Daisy was a 
household word at Mrs. Prince’s, and that 
all the best was offered by the boys to a 
dear little crippled invalid who had spent 
months in the Prince Ward at one of 
the large hospitals, enduring severe treat- 
ment in the hope of being cured. The day 
when Nan should be allowed to see her 
had been looked forward to with eager anti- 
cipation; and as they rolled the streets in 
Mrs. Prince’s carriage, Nan wondered how it 
would seem to be unable to walk at all and 
be obliged always to drive. 

Mrs. Prince was too well known as a 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


123 


frequent visitor and generous benefactor of 
the hospital to be kept waiting long. They 
made their way to a sunny corner room 
known as the Prince Ward, holding three 
beds, but one of which was occupied, and 
that by a golden-haired brown-eyed little 
creature whom Nan at once recognized from 
Lewises description as Daisy. 

Mrs. Prince laid flowers and gifts on a 
little table by the cot, and then took both 
the little hands in one of hers, saying ten- 
derly as she placed the other caressingly on 
the white forehead, — 

You are better to-day. I won’t kiss you, 
dear. Doctor says no kissing, you know. 
Microbes, bacteria, eh. Miss Deering ? ” this 
to the nurse, with whom she shook hands 
cordially. This is my young friend. Miss 
Katcliffe, Miss Deering. You will let her 
come often to see our little patient, won’t 
you ? Yes, she is a big girl for this small 
room, but she is not boisterous, and will bring 


124 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


cheer. You and Nan will be friends, Daisy. 
By and by she shall come and learn from 
you how to make her Christmas presents,” 
she said, taking up some beautiful pieces of 
embroidery with which the lame girl’s fingers 
had been busy. 

Nan felt strangely cumbersome and awk- 
ward before this spiritual little creature, 
whose hands looked to be too delicate to be 
touched by her own firm members. If she 
could only have taken her on her back and 
carried her about or performed some feat of 
strength for her benefit, her own emotion 
would have been relieved ; but as it was, 
she felt foolish and fanciful and asked the 
nurse irrelevant questions, till Mrs. Prince 
asked Miss Peering to take her through 
the hospital. Nan was relieved to get out 
into the corridors, and Mrs. Prince said to 
Daisy, — 

She is not used to sick people, and fancies 
they are suffering more than they are. She 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


125 


is really not a bit hard-hearted, only a 
little ashamed to seem soft-hearted.” 

Miss Deering was a nurse by nature as 
well as by training, a woman of rare in- 
stinct and sympathy. A large hospital ex- 
perience had brought her into relation with 
people of all conditions and natures, and she 
looked at Nan comprehendingly as she said : 
You don’t like sick people ? ” 

Oh, I should like them if I could do any- 
thing for them, but I feel so brutally healthy 
with a little thing like that, I don’t know 
what to do with my hands or feet ; and yet 
when papa is sick, he says no one can nurse 
him so well. I think I feel more >t home 
with healthy big sick people than frail 
chronic invalids.” 

Miss Deering laughed : Perhaps you 

would like to go through the men’s ward 
and see some of the big fellows with broken 
heads or noses.” 


I think I would.' 


126 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


That was the first of many visits to the 
hospital which Nan made during that fall 
and winter, and the strangeness between the 
two girls soon melted into friendship. 

It was late in November when the two sat 
together in Daisy’s bower surrounded by 
wonderful creations of silk and worsted. 

“ My fingers are all thumbs, Daisy. How 
does that look ? ” Nan held up a small piece 
of fancy work over which she had been indus- 
triously though not very deftly working for 
some time. 

That is very much better, Nannie dear. 
You are improving so much. My Lady will 
be so pleased with that at Christmas.” 

^^My Lady” was Daisy’s name for Mrs. 
Prince, — a name which she had chosen as 
sweetest for the gracious lady bountiful, who 
had done so much to bring her back to 
health and happiness. 

There was no doubt that the little girl was 
better. Her luminous brown eyes looked 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


127 


less unearthly though not less beautiful, and 
her cheeks were rounder. Her little fingers 
seemed quite strong as they made the needle 
fly in and out of the delicate mazes of her 
exquisite fancy work. 

My fingers are all thumbs ” was not an 
unusual exclamation from Nan, and Daisy 
had often been forced to agree with her; but 
to-day she said, — 

You must not slander your fingers. Nan ; 
they are improving every day, and will soon 
outstrip me.’’ 

Oh, I never could do that with my 
fingers, Daisy. I hate needles, and if it 
were n’t to please Mrs. Prince, I would never 
touch one. There are some women whom 
needles suit, but I am not going to be that 
kind. Give me a knife, a plough, or a club, 
and I would do better ; but a needle ! — 
it fairly dwarfs my intellect. It takes a 
brownie like you to transform a needle 
into a sceptre, a true fairy wand. For a 


128 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


giant like me it is nothing but an instru- 
ment of torment, — not torture, that’s too 
dignified. I never could have had the 
patience of Elaine and Penelope with their 
constant stitching. And there was Mathilda, 
William the Norman’s wife, with her old 
Bayeux tapestries. What martyrs they were ! 
I wish I were n’t like that ! Hawthorne, in 
^ Marble Faun,’ I believe, says there is always 
something womanly about a woman who 
sews ; but it was just Hilda’s mending Ken- 
yon’s glove. I could mend a glove for a 
man I loved, but it would be because I 
loved the man, not the mending. Hilda 
liked her modelling far better than her 
mending. Do you know, Daisy, Lewis is 
disgusted with me for wanting to vote, — 
says he won’t like me if I am going to be 
strong-minded. Do you think I am going 
to be frumpish and disagreeable ? ” 

Daisy gave an ujifathomable sigh, and 
looked at Nan pityingly, as if she would say. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


129 


You poor thing, beating your wings against 
a cage with iron bars.’’ Somebody read to 
me once something like this, — 

‘ A woman is too slight a thing, 

To trample the world without feeling its sting.’ ” 

Oh, I know, Daisy, that is from 
^ Lucile ; ’ but that was written before girls’ 
colleges, I guess, or else it means something 
else. Some women are frail, clinging things. 
But I am tiring you, Daisy dear. Let me 
put away the things. What a lot you have 
done, and how happy you must be to be able 
to do something useful ! ” 

Yes, I did it with my little needle,” said 
Daisy, merrily. But I can do nothing 
else.” 

Oh, what a brute I am ! I was n’t think- 
ing of your needle, I was only protesting 
against the needle for me. I shall always 
be wishing to do a man’s work and be forced 
back to do a girl’s, I suppose.” 

No, you won’t either. Nan. Did you 

9 


130 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


ever think of being a trained nurse or a 
doctor ? Miss Deering says you would make 
a splendid trained nurse.” 

I ? Such a clumsy, awkward thing as 
I am ? ” said Nan, looking around to Miss 
Deering, who sat at a window reading, 
though keenly alive to what had been 
said. 

Yes, Miss Nannie, you have just the 
temperament for a good nurse, not a mere 
machine, — steady nerves, a fondness for 
science, and a splendid constitution. You 
would do even better to study medicine.” 

Oh, I could n’t afford that. I want to 
go to work to help papa before I am twenty, 
and I was sixteen last September. Only 
four years more.” 

Why not try nursing, and study medi- 
cine later ? ” 

Do you really think I could be gentle 
enough for a nurse ? ” asked Nan, thought- 
fully. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


131 


The best nurses are not the gentlest 
women. To be a good nurse, you must 
have a determined will, and let the patient 
lean on you rather than wheedle you. One 
must have quick judgment, presence of 
mind, and above all cool nerves and strength, 
— all of which qualities you possess.^' 

“ You have given me an idea. Miss Peer- 
ing. 1 wonder if I could really do it. How 
long would 1 have to study ? You know 
we have a good course in physiology and 
anatomy at Pratt.” 

^^From eighteen months to two years in 
the training-school is required here for 
nurses.” 

“ And is the examination hard ? ” 

Not for a Pratt high-school girl. Most 
of the girls who come here have had only a 
common-school education, and the course of 
study required is difficult for them. You 
w'ould be very fairly equipped to begin the 
study of medicine after your graduation.” 


132 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Oh, but that is out of the question. 
Papa could not afford it, and I think they 
would like me to study nursing the best. 
You don’t know what a load you have 
taken off my heart. It has been puzzling 
me so much. I really did not know what 
I could fit myself for, unless it was profes- 
sional ball playing or physical culture. And 
I am not graceful like Miss Eliot. I don’t 
seem to have any talent except for athletics. 
Teaching takes so much patience, and I 
can’t stand stupidity. I have thought seri- 
ously of running a steamboat round our 
lake. I knew a girl who did that all one 
summer. Her father had been captain of 
the boat and was ill. She went to the Nor- 
mal School in the winter. She was my great 
ideal when I was twelve years old. I could 
do that, I think, for I know just where every 
snag and rock on our shore is. But to be 
a nurse or a doctor would be more dignified. 
Of course there would not always be interest- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


133 


ing cases with wounds to bind and ether to 
administer, but there would be generally a 
feeling of doing something worth doing, not 
pottering about with buttons and thread.” 

There is plenty of pottering in nursing 
too. There ’s the ambulance, — an accident. 
I am on duty this hour, — must go down. 
Miss Perkins will bring your supper, Daisy. 
Good-by, Miss Nannie.” 

Oh, I must go. Good-by, Daisy,” said 
Nan, breathlessly, as the nurse brought in 
Daisy’s tray. 

Descending to the lower hall, she caught 
sight of the ambulance surgeon and the 
orderlies attending to the patient just 
brought in. 

Miss Deering was passing into the oper- 
ating-room with a tray of bandages, and there 
was a smell of ether and iodoform pervading 
the precincts that, far from sickening Nan, 
fairly intoxicated her. 

Oh, I would give a dollar to be in there,” 


134 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


she said to herself. Just then she caught 
sight of one of the younger undergraduate 
nurses. 

How many nurses can go into the oper- 
ating-room ? ” asked Nan, eagerly. 

“ That depends. Sometimes four or five.” 

‘‘ Do you have work to do ? ” 

Oh, no ; sometimes we only look on.” 

Do the doctors know you all by name ? ” 

The house physicians know most of us, 
except some of the new undergraduates.” 

I wish you would change clothes with 
me, and let me slip in there for just ten 
minutes,” Nan said daringly. 

The girl looked amazed, but, knowing Nan 
to be somewhat privileged as Mrs. Prince’s 
protegee, and being in the habit of acting 
quickly, she said, — 

Come in here, then, and be quick. The 
ambulance surgeon is a new one, and the 
attendant outside doctor won’t know ; but 
Miss Deering will.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


135 


She ’s all right/’ said Nan, dropping into 
the slang she could hardly help learning 
from the boys. 

The change of costume was rapidly made, 
though it took some seconds to twist Nan’s 
heavy braids under the nurse’s cap ; but when 
the masquerading was arranged. Nan stole a 
peep into the glass to see herself transformed. 

How pretty you look ! ” escaped from the 
nurse, involuntarily. 

I wish I did n’t,” said Nan, candidly, 
feeling that perhaps being pretty was going 
to be an obstacle to the success of her 
chosen career. 

She slipped into the operating-room in the 
train of several nurses, and the door closed 
behind her. 

What Nan saw in the awful depths of that 
mysterious operating-room she did not re- 
veal, but she went out a sadder and wiser 
girl than she went in. If she decided to 
take up the study of medicine or nursing. 


136 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


she would surely do so with her eyes opened 
to some of its horrors. She did not at once 
make known her intentions even to Mrs. 
Prince or Lewis, or betray them in her let- 
ters to her mother and father. She was not 
quite sure that Mrs. Prince, in spite of her 
broad philanthropy, might not consider such 
a step too radical, and Lewis was perhaps 
the very last person to whom she would 
confide her choice of a career. 

Lewis was just then at a period of exist- 
ence — reached at an earlier age, by reason 
of his environments, than comes to most rich 
boys — when the local blots out the universal. 
He thought a great deal about what the 
fellows of his set considered the thing,” and 
the fellows took their tone from their older 
sisters. 

If Lewis had not loved Nan more, he 
would have admired her less for choosing to 
go to the Pratt rather than one of the 
more fashionable private schools which she 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


137 


might have attended. As it was, there were 
times when he could not quite forgive her 
for that, and Nan knew him too well to 
abuse the laws of hospitality by creating any 
further breach by any more open indepen- 
dence, even though her future might be far 
beyond the home which now shaped her 
young life so luxuriously. 

There seemed, however, to be plenty of 
time, she reflected, though the possibility of 
changing her mind did not occur to her, and 
she brought a more pertinent interest to her 
study of anatomy and chemistry. Chance, 
however, threw her in the way of choosing 
another confldant, when, going into the hos- 
pital one Saturday afternoon a fortnight 
after her stolen experience, she encountered 
Marshall Whittemore. 

Why, Nan, you here ? 

Marsh, where did you come from ? ’’ 
Nan answered first. I am going to see 
a friend in the Prince Ward. I come 


138 


NAl^ IN THE CITY. 


every Saturday. I thought you were in 
Princeton.” 

^^Well, I am or was,” said Marshall, his 
large mouth expansively smiling. I am 
just down for the Sunday ; but I was going 
through the hospital with a friend of mine, 
one of the internes. I am thinking of study- 
ing medicine, and he tells me I am wasting 
time and money by spending three years at 
college first. He wants to try my nerve by 
taking me into the amphitheatre. Here he 
is now. — Be there in a minute, Doc. — Tell 
me. Nan, may I walk home with you ? 
What time will you be out ? ” 

Half-past four,” said Nan, blushing to 
the roots of her hair, as she recognized 
in Marshall’s friend the ambulance surgeon 
of that luckless Saturday. Marshall, seeing 
the blush, attributed it, with Nan’s stylish 
appearance, to a change towards the young- 
lady period. His friend, however, recog- 
nized Nan too well. He had looked in vain 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


139 


among the nurses for the girl with the 
splendid figure and golden braids, and turned 
now to Marshall for an explanation. 

Who is that stunning girl, Marsh ? ” 
asked the young doctor. 

That is Miss Anna Ratclifie,” said Mar- 
shall a little stiffly, for he had the chivalrous 
feeling which all the camp boys had for 
Nan, aside from a personal fondness, and 
disliked to have her stared at in public 
places. 

From Camp Chicopee ? asked the 
young doctor, who was not to be snubbed 
too easily. 

^^Mr. Ratcliffe’s daughter, yes,” Marsh 
answered, still more curtly. 

‘‘ She is studying to be a trained nurse ? ” 
continued Dr. Arnold, half affirmatively and 
half interrogatively. 

The dickens ! That is a joke. Study- 
ing to be a trained nurse ! Arnold, where 
did you get that notion? She is spending 


140 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


the winter at Mrs. Eeginald Prince’s, and 
goes to the Pratt Institute. She is only 
sixteen. A trained nurse, — that is a joke ! ” 

What will you wager she is n’t ? ”• 

I won’t bet, but I ’d like you to prove 
she is.” 

Why, certainly. At least four fellows 
and as many nurses must have seen her in 
the operating-room two weeks ago, when I 
brought in that trolley-car chap who had to 
lose his arm.” 

You ’ll swear to that, did you say, and 
half a dozen other fellows ? I can’t tell you 
you lie, but I ’ll hear her first.” 

Arnold changed the subject, but Marshall 
was in no mood to appreciate the lecture 
in the amphitheatre, and looked at his 
watch so frequently that the young surgeon 
rallied him, — 

Remember, Marsh, you are to give me 
the benefit of the doubt. Your fair friend 
may not own up, but she was there.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


141 


If she was there, she ’ll not lie out of it. 

She could sit through an autopsy easier than 
tell a lie ; that ’s Nan Ratcliff e ! ” 

Nevertheless Marshall was not so confident 
as he would have his friend believe, when he 
met Nan at half-past four at the outside door 
of the hospital, for Nan herself had a self- 
conscious, almost guilty look which was not 
at all like her usually frank manner, that 
filled Marshall with apprehension ; but he < 

went straight to the point, — 

I say. Nan, are you studying to be a 
trained nurse ? ” 

Nan laughed and answered evasively, — 

And what if I were ? Would you think 
I had taken leave of my senses, or turned my 
back on my ^ social position,’ as Lewis says ? ” 

I should n’t think either, but that you 
were too young for anything so stiff. Are 
you really now. Nan ? ” 

Well, no, I am not, just now. But I 
think I may when I finish my course at the 


142 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Pratt Institute. I shall be seventeen and a 
half then, you see.” 

^^Then he did lie,” cried Marshall, ex- 
citedly, to Nan’s amazement, darting back 
towards the hospital, where he proposed im- 
mediately to set his friend right ; but Nan, 
grasping the situation, exclaimed, — 

No, he did n’t, Marshall, if you mean 
that Dr. Arnold saw me in the operating- 
room. I was there. What possessed me to 
do it, I don’t know, — something more than 
idle curiosity, I think. I had been talking 
to Miss Deering, the head nurse, about my 
studying to be a trained nurse, and a wild 
impulse to test my nerves came over me. 
When I saw the chance to slip into the 
operating-room, I did it. I fairly bullied 
one of the undergraduate nurses into letting 
me take her uniform.” 

Whew ! ” said Marshall, you did have 
nerve. How did you like it ? I guess 
your zeal for surgery cooled, did n’t it ? ” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


143 


No, it did n’t a bit. It would have six 
weeks ago, but you see they gave us a little 
experience with the knife at school, and I 
have had a good dose of bones and arteries 
this term.” 

You are a trump. Nan. But what ’ll I 
tell Arnold ? ” 

Tell him the truth, but ask him to keep 
it a secret. I could n’t stand disgrace before 
the faculty, and I ’d rather Mrs. Prince and 
Lewis did n’t know just yet. Are you really 
going to study medicine, Marshall ? ” 

Yes, I think so. I always intended to 
after I finished college, and my father is 
feeling the hard times so much that I am 
thinking seriously of cutting my college 
course and going right at the bones. Of 
course I won’t be so cultivated as a man, 
and I shall miss lots of good times, for I 
have got into a good set at college on account 
of being fairly athletic. But a fellow has to 
grind like anything to be a doctor ; then 


144 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


he has to serve a couple of years in the 
hospital before he can practise, so that I 
shall be twenty-four before I shall be off my 
father’s hands, and I would be twenty-seven 
if I waited to take my degree at Princeton. 
Why do you go in for nursing ? ” 

For the same reason, — to take myself 
off my father’s hands. There ’s Robbie to 
be educated. Girls have a right to their 
independence nowadays as well as boys,” 
said Nan, proudly. 

Well, I guess you will win in that race 
too. Nan. Anyway, I think you have pluck 
enough to be anything you want to be. 
Here we are at Mrs. Prince’s.” 

You must come in and see Lewis, Mar- 
shall, and Mrs. Prince will be very glad to 
see you ; but not a word about the nursing, 
that ’s my secret as yet,” said Nan, as they 
were admitted. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE CHICOPEE COACH AT THE GREAT GAME. 

THANKSGIVING ! Hi ! Ki ! Yah ! 

^ Rah ! Rah 1 ” 

These were some of the cries, accom- 
panied by a frightful tooting of horns, that 
made Nan’s holiday morning nap most 
hideous, as, her eyes following her ears, she 
saw the fantastic vision of two masked faces 
at her bedside. Most preposterous as to 
noses and rotund as to cheeks, the legs alone 
betrayed the early visitors as Wolcott and 
Harry, who thus initiated Nan into the early 
ceremonies of Thanksgiving day in New 
York State. Nan’s previous impressions of 
that feast day of the pilgrim fathers were 
entirely associated with the national bird 
and pumpkin -pies. The tooting of horns 


146 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


and adornment of false faces was confined 
to Fourth of July pageants in her memory ; 
but Wolcott gleefully enlightened her on 
New York customs, begging her to get up at 
once that she might lose none of this part of 
the fun. 

Lewis won’t any more, he ’s too grown 
up; but you will, won’t you, Nan? Come 
down and see the ragamuffins with masks 
at the area door. Cook always gives them 
goodies on Thanksgiving ; mamma tells 
her to.” 

So Nan, who could never refuse Wolcott 
anything, though very much inclined to take 
half an hour more sleep in celebration of the 
holiday, and as a terrific blowing of horns 
seemed to put an end to peace, soon joined 
the little boys at the lower door, where she 
found nearly a dozen children in fantastic 
dress, — old skirts and bonnets, even hoop- 
skirts and sun-bonnets, — with faces covered 
by every kind of carnival mask, — donkeys’ 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


147 


heads and darkies’ faces, clowns and cherubs, 
— disguising them very effectually. 

The cook, who entered into the spirit of 
it, was distributing generous pieces of cake 
and big red apples ; thus increasing rather 
than dispersing the crowd, and delaying her 
preparations for breakfast. 

All at once Giovanni appeared, broom in 
hand, ready for his morning work of sweep- 
ing off the sidewalk ; and it was no part of 
his programme to sweep up crumbs for beg- 
gars. He had no Thanksgiving spirit in his 
heart, and, taking one young reveller by the 
trail of a calico skirt, another by the back of 
a sun-bonnet, he pitched them unceremo- 
niously into the street, while the others in 
terror of the Italian’s tongue and hand fled 
precipitately. When Wolcott and Harry 
rushed out upon them with their carnival 
masks, gavotting about him in glee, he only 
smiled suavely, and touched his hat to Nan, 
as he began his sweeping with the speed of 


148 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


a trolley-car. Giovanni, like Nan, had some- 
thing in mind on this Thanksgiving day 
that if made into a charade would have read 
like this, — 

“ My first is in color like the bumble-bee, 

That flits from flower to flower ; 

My second’s like a Noah’s ark that rides upon 
the sea ; 

My whole, if full, a mascot bears. 

Good luck my first to dower.” 

But Giovanni did n’t know anything about 
charades, and he only knew that up in Mrs. 
Prince’s house was a remarkable dress which 
he had been bribed by Master Lewis to wear, 
while Nan was thinking of her orange and 
black waist, and her new black cape with 
its orange lining; and the answer to the 
whole was not far to find, for nobody, not 
even the little boys, had anything in mind' 
but the Chicopee coach for the Princeton 
game, which was to start at ten o’clock from 
Mrs. Prince’s and to join the gala-day pro- 
cession in Madison Square at eleven. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


149 


Giovanni looks like a tiger, does n’t he, 
Nan?” said Lewis, appearing, and making 
an odd grimace over the prospective vision 
of Giovanni in the tiger costume prepared 
for him. 

I was awfully afraid mother would put 
a stop to it,” said Lewis ; but Giovanni 
has seen the carnival in Italy, and he 
does n’t mind being made a spectacle of, 
like a Yankee or an Irishman. I took him 
up to the stables last night, and showed him 
the coach all trimmed in orange and black, 
and told him just how he was to stand at 
the back, and how he could hold on ; and 
he was as pleased as Punch. But won’t he 
look like a Punchinello in that orange and 
black suit ? He admires immensely the silk 
hat trimmed in orange ribbons. Won’t it be 
just fun ? ” 

I wonder if he really minds,” said Nan. 

Of course he does n’t ; he thinks it an 
honor, and it is,” Lewis replied. “ I guess 


150 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


lots of fellows would be willing to wear 
orange and black trousers for the chance 
of riding on a tally-ho to see that game 
to-day. You have n’t an idea of it, Nan. 
It is the biggest thing you ever dreamed 
of ; and this year, with Marshall in the rush- 
line, and Princeton sure to win, why, it ’ll 
be simply immense ! Hello, here ’s a mes- 
senger boy ; wonder what ’s up ! A package 
— for ^ Miss Anna Eatcliffe,’ — that ’s you. 
Nan, — a box of flowers.” 

Nan, who was not used to receiving flowers, 
broke the string and opened the box to find 
within a bunch of gorgeous orange chrysan- 
themums, bearing Marshall Whittemore’s 
card, on which he had written, ~ 

Dear Nan, — Please wear my flowers to-day, 
and bring good luck to old Nassua, and your old 
friend Marsh. 

Nan flushed for a moment proudly, and 
then, pleased as a child, carried them ofl to 
show to Mrs. Prince, at the same time saying, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


151 


You must wear one of them, Mrs. Prince, 
so that we can all wish Marshall good luck.” 

Oh, no, dear,” Mrs. Prince answered, 
smiling and kissing the young girl tenderly. 

think you had better wear them all; I 
have some in the conservatory.” 

Marshall might have known we would 
have plenty in the conservatory, and you 
girls would of course wear his colors,” 
said Lewis, a little petulantly. 

I think it was very thoughtful of him, 
when he was so busy,” said Nan, uncon- 
sciously and without a bit of vanity ; but 
Jill and Miss Eliot must have some.” 

“ We will get some for them, if they 
are not already provided,” said Mrs. Prince ; 
then laughingly added : - My dear, it would 
not be fair to Marshall for you to distribute 
his gift among the other girls. Lewis, pick 
some of those orange chrysanthemums in the 
conservatory and send them around to Jill. 
Don’t you think it would be a fair division ? ” 


152 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


^^All right — if you say so. Van can 
take them off at once.” Lewis disappeared, 
his pique at Nan’s failure to wear their 
chrysanthemums for the time being con- 
soled, but soon returning. 

“ How about Miss Eliot, mother ? ” 

We will decorate her later, if she is not 
otherwise provided,” said Mrs Prince, pass- 
ing into the breakfast-room with an amused 
smile on her lips, which had its explanation 
an hour later, when Margaret appeared 
wearing a beautiful bunch of orange flowers 
outside her black coat, and followed by 
Cousin Harold and Steve. 

We thought we would join you here, 
Mrs. Prince,” said Steve, instead of in Madi- 
son Square ; but there wdll be half a dozen of 
the boys over there who have come to town 
for the game. Ernest Lovering and Jamie 
Hale have come up from Laurenceville, and 
Howard Crawford and Davy Baker from 
Hotchkiss. Davy says, though he is go- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


153 


ing to Yale, he is going to wear Princeton 
colors to-day.” 

Why, we are all going to do that much 
for Marsh to-day. The Chicopee coach is 
nothing if not an Independent. When our 
Chicopee champion is a Yale fellow, why, we 
trim our coach in blue ; when he is a Harvard 
chap, why, our flags are crimson. Now, when 
I ’m in Harvard,’’ said Lewis, proudly antici- 
pating his preliminaries,” I shall expect 
the Chicopee coach to fly crimson.” 

To-day not one of us will dare to show a 
violet,” said Miss Eliot. It ’s the first time 
I ever turned my colors, but I am sworn to 
Chicopee to-day.” 

iVnd so am I,” said Jill, coming with an 
oriole in her black velvet hat and Lewis’s 
flowers pinned on to her jacket. 

“And lest there should be any doubt,” 
said Mrs. Prince, entering with three gor- 
geous umbrellas striped in orange and black, 
“ I have these Princeton umbrellas as sou- 


154 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


venirs of the occasion/’ presenting each girl 
with one. 

But our flying colors are yet to be seen/’ 
said Lewis, leading the party of young peo- 
ple to the back windows which gave a view 
of the back yard, where Giovanni, arrayed 
in trousers striped in orange and black, a 
coat of black, and broad orange necktie with 
flying ends, and crowned by a silk hat 
wound with orange ribbons, paraded the 
flagstones, for the admiration of the maids 
and Wolcott and Harry. 

That is our tiger,” said Lewis. 

^^Well, I think he is good-natured,” said 
Harold. 

He is an Italian, and loves a carnival,” 
said Mrs. Prince, apologetically. 

I have no doubt he will enjoy the game,” 
said Steve, adjusting his glasses. 

Soon the sound of a horn announced the 
arrival of the coach, and they all rushed 
eagerly to the front of the house to see the 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


155 


great tally-ho, beautifully dressed in yellow 
and black bunting and bearing on either 
side the ensign, Camp Chicopee.” 

Quite a crowd gathered on the sidewalk 
quickly, as crowds will in cities, and by the 
time the party were ready to mount, their 
sidewalk was the centre of observation. 

But we must get used to crowds to-day,” 
said Mrs, Prince, leading the girls out with 
a gracious smile on her face, like one who is 
always willing to give pleasure even to a 
street crowd of unknown boys and girls. 

The boys were soon filling the inside of 
the coach with wraps and umbrellas, and 
Giovanni was the bearer of a big hamper of 
luncheon ; and as he had been instructed to 
ride inside until they joined the procession 
in New York, he soon withdrew his bumble- 
bee costume from the public gaze, and the 
girls proceeded to clamber up the ladder to 
the seats on the top of the coach, — Jill 
squealing in a way which betrayed that she 


156 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


had never mounted a tally-ho before ; Nan 
and Harry going hand over hand by the 
front wheels, in joyful recollection of a jolly 
drive of the last summer, which, though 
wonderful in its sights and experiences, could 
not compare with that which was before 
them on this Thanksgiving day. 

What a contrast the coach itself to the 
lumbering old stagecoach of the country 
roads ! Strong and firm, yet swaying almost 
lightly, it bowled over the pavements, differ- 
ing as much from the turnpike stage as the 
old sailing-vessels do from the racing-yacht. 
On they went, following the less frequented 
streets, till they reached the great bridge 
where its mighty span makes two monster 
cities one. The day was hazy, yet beyond 
against the sky rose the splendid domes and 
gothic towers of New York’s majestic build- 
ings, and in only a few moments they were 
borne along in the crowds of pressing vehi- 
cles in Lower Broadway. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


157 


On top of this coach, above the stress and 
storm of the streets, Nan looked with a new 
pleasure upon that wonderful vista of Broad- 
way which seems to converge in the lovely 
tower of Grace Church at Tenth Street ; and 
as that seemed to come nearer, beyond could 
be seen the white splendor of the Manhat- 
tan Building and the graceful form of St. 
Gaudens’s Diana poised on the tower at 
Madison Square Garden. Nan had seen 
these before, and the widening beauty of 
splendid Fifth Avenue beyond ; but to-day 
the whole scene was decked and alive with 
an array of coaches and bunting, most 
splendid to behold, — coach after coach gor- 
geously trimmed, some in blue, some in crim- 
son, many in orange and black, others in the 
parti-colors of smaller colleges; coaches in 
twos and fours ; coaches on which there were 
only students, noisy and jubilant as students 
always are on these days; and coaches bril- 
liant with handsomely dressed ladies, and 


158 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


pretty girls loaded with flowers, — violets on 
the Yale coaches, jacqueminot roses on the 
Harvard, chrysanthemums on the Princeton, 
— and from all a gay floating of ribbons 
and flying of flags, while the horns tooted 
a deafening din. 

As the Chicopee coach drew up to a well- 
known hotel to join the procession, half a 
dozen boys rushed clamorously towards it, 
crying the old camp yell, Hi ! Ki ! Kah ! 
Rah ! and soon Nan welcomed her summer 
companions in her comrade way, introducing 
them to Jill and Miss Eliot as ^^Our Chi- 
copee Boys ; and soon notes were being 
compared that brought the very genius of 
Chicopee to the occasion, and showed to Miss 
Eliot her very first glimpse of the little lady 
of the lake. 


CHAPTER IX. 

GIOVANNI AS THE PRINCETON MASCOT. 

A S the coaches neared the scene of the 
great contest, the broad avenue seemed 
to Nan a tide of humanity moving on like 
an immense flood. The trains thundering 
along the elevated railroads overhead added 
to the din, and with the ever-increasing war- 
cries of the college boys, punctuated by the 
shrill toots of bugles. Nan’s blood was stirred 
with excitement. The coach at last rolled up 
before the gates of the polo grounds. The 
boys were wild with the spirit of jubilee, 
and yelled like Comanche Indians as their 
coach came at last into the grounds. But 
that was just the thing to do ; the more 
noise the better, was apparently the rule of 


160 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


the hour. The first glimpse of the scene 
in the grounds was another incentive for 
the Chicopee youngsters to outcry their 
neighbors. 

Oh, Jill ! ” exclaimed Nan, bouncing up, 
all enthusiasm, does n’t it look like a pic- 
ture of the Roman Coliseum, with the people 
gathered to see a gladiatorial fight ! Oh, 
dear ! ” she added quickly, with an appre- 
hensive quake, “ I hope Marshall won’t get 
hurt.” 

Nonsense ! ” interrupted Lewis, with the 
air of one who speaks from experience, the 
crowd is n’t going to play the game.” 

Nan saw a stretch of turf banked in on 
every side by swarms of excited men and 
women, brilliant with college colors. Be- 
yond rose grand stands literally black with 
humanity. In the distance the masses of 
people were as swarms of flies. Even the 
roofs of adjoining houses were black with 
people ; the telegraph poles, even behind 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


161 


the fence, were resting-places for adven- 
turous urchins and men. People, people, 
everywhere, and still the crowds surged 
into the grounds^ increasing the roar and 
the enthusiasm of the moment. The ex- 
citement was electrifying. Men, with long 
ribbons streaming from their hats, wav- 
ing big flags, would pop up in front of a 
crowd, flap their arms like roosters, and 
shout, — 

Now, fellows, nine cheers for Princeton!” 

And, banked together, they would shake 
and shout in unison, — 

Hooray, hooray 1 Tiger 1 siss, boom, 
a-r ! Princeton ! ” 

From the other side would come the 
defiant Yale yell, copied from Harvard’s 
slower cheer, — 

’Rah 1 ’Rah ! ’rah ! ’rah ! ’rah ! ’rah ! 
’rah 1 ’rah ! ’rah 1 Y-a-l-e 1 ” with the Yale 
prolonged. 

Then the tune changed. With a fervor 


11 


162 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


born of conviction, there rose a mighty poean 
from the Princeton men, ^ — 

Oh ray ! Oh ray ! 

How we ’ll whip old Eli ! ” 

A derisive reply thundered from the throats 
of Yale, — 

“Yale! Yale! Yale! 

How we’ll pull the tiger’s tail ! ” 

It was now a tremendous vocal battle. A 
battery of Yale men on a neighboring coach 
poured out a volley, — 

“ Brek-ek-ek-ek-ek, 
Co-ax-co-ax-co-ax, 

Whoa up, whoa up, 

Parabaloo, 

Yale ! ” 

Princeton turned to music, and all up and. 
down the lines of the orange and black’s 
legions rang the song, — 

“ Swim out, old Eli ! 

We ’ll whip the raen in blue. 

Gailey ’s in the centre. 

And he knows just what to do.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


163 


But Yale’s clinking battle-cry — Yale ! 
Yale ! Yale ! ” — like strokes on an anvil, 
rose clear above Princeton’s song, and threw 
the orange and black into confusion. Then, 
as if to emphasize Yale’s vocal victory, the 
famous Yale mascot, a diminlitive bull-dog, 
wearing a blanket bearing the legend “ Yale 
always beats Princeton,” made his appear- 
ance, led by an exuberant youth, arrayed in 
a sweater and a long ulster, and started 
across the field straight toward Princeton’s 
sacred precincts. This provoked a torrent 
of cheers from Yale and howls from Prince- 
ton. Now, Giovanni, who had taken his 
position as footman when the coach joined 
the procession, did not have the slightest 
idea what the noise was all about, but 
shouted too. He jumped up and down on 
the coach, frantically waving an immense 
Princeton flag on which • a yellow tiger was 
painted, and screaming at the top of his power- 
ful lungs, T-i-g-a-r-e ! T-i-g-a-r-e ! ” 


164 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Beside the Chicopee coach, just inside the 
line, lay a group of favored Princeton boys, 
coaches, and substitutes. They heard Gio- 
vanni’s frantic shouts, and when they saw 
this grotesque figure, they held a quick con- 
sultation resulting in a new attack on the 
enemy. Jumping to their feet, they shouted 
to Giovanni, Come down here, Tigare, we 
want you,” shaking some tempting green- 
backs before him. In an instant the Italian 
took a fiying leap over the heads of the 
crowd near the coach, and landed on his 
feet among the grinning conspirators. 

Say, Tigare,” said one young fellow in a 
Princeton jersey, you must be the tiger’s 
mascot. Come on ! ” at the same time 
shoving some bankbills into Giovanni’s 
willing fingers. Then a procession was 
started up Princeton’s line, with Giovanni 
proudly -leading, jumping with fiery enthu- 
siasm, at every step shrieking at the top 
of his voice, Tigare ! Tigare ! Tigare ! ” 






r 

J 


I 

I 

• • 
















I;.- 

&t» I* 


« 










» 




The Little Dog broke away fkoivi his Master 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


165 


Bcliind him came the Princeton’s coaches 
and subs,” yelling in unison, — 

Here ’s the mascot Princeton ’s got ; 

He 's better luck than Yale’s little pup.” 

Cheers mingled with shouts of laughter 
greeted this diversion. But a few seconds 
later pandemonium reigned. Giovanni seized 
the idea that he and the Yale dog represented 
opposing elements, and suddenly his excited 
mind conceived a daring and unique proj- 
ect. Without a word of warning he seized 
an immense brass horn from one of his 
escorts, and charged at the dog. The 
youngster leading the dog was at that mo- 
ment blowing a horn, and did not have his 
wits about him. At the sight of this ex- 
traordinary figure making hostile demonstra- 
tions and emitting unearthly yells, the little 
dog broke away from his master, and with 
a howl of anguish put his tail between his 
legs and ran for dear life, with Giovanni 
after him. On the Princeton side of the 


166 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


field Bedlam was let loose. The terrified 
dog darted on and disappeared among the 
Yale boys on the other side of the field. 
Then Giovanni stopped, and, taking the big 
horn, blew defiant blasts, waving his banner 
like a flag-bearer after a successful battle. 

I When he came running back to Princeton’s 
side of the field, he received an ovation 
which would have made John the Orange 
Man ” of Harvard envious. Money was 
showered upon him, and as, wreathed in 
smiles, Giovanni climbed up on the coach 
again, he panted to Nan, Mascot now ; 
’nufi money to buy fruit-store.” 

All this happened much more quickly than 
it could be told, and was only a prepara- 
tion for the outbreak of an almost deafening 
din which presently began with the appear- 
ance of a procession of fine-looking typical 
American college athletes, of sturdy build 
and yet lithe and graceful movements, all 
wearing the Yale uniform. There are the 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


167 


Yales,” shouted Lewis ; but, great Scott ! 
they are n’t as big as the Prince tons. Just 
look, Nan ! ” 

Sure enough, from the corner nearest the 
Chicopee coach came another procession of 
larger, more compactly built, and more 
powerful young men wearing the Princeton 
jersey. As the two elevens trotted down 
the field to their respective places, amidst a 
tornado of shouts, Lewis shrieked to the 
Chicopee people : We Ve got ’em. Prince- 
ton has the brawn.” 

But Nan was looking at Marshall as he 
walked with firmness and confidence, his 
head well up, among his companions. 

Marsh is n’t afraid of losing. He goes 
in to win,” she said, pointing out to Jill 
Chicopee’s champion. 

The players quickly placed themselves in 
position and began a little preliminary 
practice, while the captains and two men in 
comfortable ulsters consulted in the middle 


168 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


of the field. Some one tossed up a coin, 
and then a hurricane of cheers burst from 
fifty thousand throats, while waving banners 
and hats along the lines created a whirlwind. 
The young gladiators quickly took their 
places, and crouched in readiness for the 
play to begin. A handsome, smiling Prince- 
ton man came up the field from his position 
back of the line, surveyed the oval-shaped 
ball a moment, and gave it a resounding 
thwack with his foot which sent it flying far 
down the field. Then it seemed to Nan as 
if all the enthusiasm bottled in the mighty 
multitude were let out. The very earth 
seemed to shake ; the great game had begun. 
For a moment the girl’s heart stood still, but 
the unnatural clamor no longer impressed 
her. The excitement was so contagious that 
it buoyed her up, and before she knew it she 
was screaming encouragement and advice to 
Marshall, her voice being but an atom, lost 
in this tremendous cataclysm of sound. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


1G9 


Yale catches the ball, and back it flies 
like a shot, propelled by the lithe full- 
back on the Yale team. For a second Nan’s 
heart stood still with sudden fear. How 
those Yale rushers tore down the field ! 
They brushed the Princeton boys aside 
as if they were statues ! Ah ! who had 
fumbled the ball ? It was on Princeton’s 
goal line, and, ah ! miracle of miracles ! 
the famous Princeton kicker sent the ball 
right against the chest of a young Yale 
giant, who, clutching it, tore his way 
through the stupefied tigers and made a 
touchdown for Yale. And all this agony, 
excitement, and disappointment in only five 
minutes. Then happened some of the most 
singular things Nan ever saw. Yale men 
seemed to go crazy with delight. A mighty 
roar of joy came from their side of the field, 
and the few groups of Yale men on Nan’s 
side of the grounds hugged one another and 
danced for joy. 


170 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Just then Yale kicked a neat goal from 
the touchdown, and the happy Yale crowd 
burst into a chorus, — 

“ Line up, rushers, line up with a will ! 

We have always beaten Princeton, and we always 
will.” 

Nan felt very sad ; she thought Princeton 
was surely beaten, and to her great delight 
she heard Lewis say to her in his hearty, 
confident way, — 

It was only a fluke. Nan, and can’t 
happen again. The ground is wet, and 
Princeton will have to drop kicking and try 
rushing. Oh, we ’ll win yet. Just see how 
the boys line up ! See that bull-headed fel- 
low standing back ready to run! They 
call him Keeley, the perpetual-motion man, 
because he never tires out. My ! see him 
go bang through the Yale line. Ah 1 they 
can’t hold him, they can’t.” 

As if inspired, the Princeton army began 
to sing like a battle song, — 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


171 


“ Right thro’ the centre, 

Now round the ends, 

Shove ’em thro’, striped tigers of Princeton ; 
Shove ’em thro’, shove ’em thro’. 

Shove ’em thro’.” 

The effect was inspiring. The Princeton 
tigers threw themselves like human catapults 
against the defenders of the blue, and tore 
apart their opponent’s line as if they were 
playing with children. The Princeton tiger 
was aroused, and the life and vigor of this 
new play fairly confounded the Yale boys at 
first. Now the tireless Keeley, now his mate 
battered through the Yale line, carrying the 
ball farther up the field each time. But the 
Yale men, gathering themselves together with 
characteristic pluck, made a determined effort 
to withstand Princeton’s onslaught. The 
two lines at this juncture suggested two men 
grappling with each other, swaying back- 
ward and forward. 

While Princeton’s advance was being mo- 
mentarily stayed. Nan caught up her opera- 


172 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


glasses and looked at Marshall. lYitli his 
face set like iron, half crouching, his sinewy 
arms swaying in front, with his hair stand- 
ing out in a bushy mass, Marshall, in his 
striped uniform, looked like a young tiger 
ready to spring. Nan saw him warily turn. 
The wiry Princeton quarter-back made a 
quick movement, and then all was a tangle 
of writhing bodies and wriggling legs. Sud- 
denly out of the squirming mass Marshall 
emerged with the jaunty Princeton captain 
close at his elbow. 

Marsh has the ball ! ” shouted Lewis, 
fairly wild with excitement. See him 
come ; see how the tigers guard him ! Come 
on. Marsh ! Come on, old boy, come on, old 
Marsh ! ” 

With his head erect, the precious ball 
under his left arm, and his right left free to 
fend off his opponents, Marshall circled 
around a Yale half-back, and started down 
the field at a tremendous burst of speed. 



]\1au>iiall’s Run 




NAN IN THE CITY. 


173 


On he flashed down the Princeton side of the 
field with the fury of a battle-charger. A 
glimpse of his face stamped with fierce de- 
termination thrilled Nan. On he came, ten, 
twenty, thirty, forty, fifty yards, before the 
Yale full-back and the half-back near him 
could close up on him. The sons of old 
Nassua almost stampeded with excitement, 
as Marshall swept by them towards the Yale 
goal ; and when he was finally stopped, their 
joy knew no bounds. Marshall had carried 
the ball to within five yards of Yale’s line. 
A touchdown for Princeton was inevitable, 
and Marshall was the hero of the moment. 
Then the big fellows, puffing and steaming, 
lined up. There was a sudden heave of the 
Princeton men, followed by a pyramid of 
twisting bodies, with the referee and umpire 
darting here and there to see who had the 
ball and where it was. As the heap of 
players gradually unwound itself, Princeton 
players began to jump in the air, shouting. 


174 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Touchdown, touchdown for Princeton/' and 
then the joy of the orange and black was 
unrestrained. Presently a goal was kicked, 
and the score was tied — 6 to 6. 

^^Now, Nan,” said Lewis, ^^see if I wasn’t 
right about the fluke.” 

And Lewis was right. The rest of the 
game remained with Nan as a jumbled series 
of pictures, of the Princeton tigers battering 
the demoralized but always plucky Yale 
boys down the field ; of Princeton men 
plunging through the Yale line here, and 
tearing through there, making touchdown 
after touchdown until the game ended. 
Then came the crowning scene. The Prince- 
ton legions flooded the field, bearing the 
champions and their orange banner away 
in victory. 

In all the tumult Marshall did not for- 
get one figure, of whom he had caught 
glimpses now and then, standing on the 
Chicopee coach. As he was borne in tri- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


175 


umph past Nan, he waved his hand to her, 
who was envied by more than one girl on 
the coaches near by. Then the Chicopee 
party wild with enthusiasm, drove home, 
all talking of the great game, and think- 
ing of nothing else for days to come, re- 
gretting, in the dinner which followed at 
Mrs. Prince’s, that Marshall was conspicu- 
ously absent, held, as he was, by the victori- 
ous eleven to join in its jubilee. 


CHAPTER X. 


MRS. PRINCE INVITES GUESTS TO A 
CHRISTMAS PARTY. 

A /r AMMA smiles all the time nowadays/’ 
i V J. said W olcott, confidentially, to Harry 
one morning early in December. 

Why, Christmas is coming,” said Harry, 
with the wise look of the eleven-year-old 
boy who has discovered the Santa Claus 
myth to lie in the generous heart of a loving 
mamma. Of course she is making plans 
for the holidays.” 

I know what I want,” said Wolcott, 
mysteriously. 

I know what I want, too ; I ’m making 
my list out now,” said Harry. 

And I know what I want, too,” said 
Nan, coming into the nursery. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


177 


Oh, what do you want, Nan ? ” asked 
Harry, anxious to make a minute of Nan’s 
slightest wish, for use when the great time 
came to buy presents. And taking his bank 
from the mantelpiece, to shake its sounding 
richness proudly, I think I must have 
’most five dollars,” he added, sure that Nan 
would not wish for anything that should 
cost a tenth of that precious sum. 

Oh, you can’t buy my wish, dear ; it is 
worth its weight in gold.” 

Oh, tell us what it is. Nan, do ! ” begged 
Wolcott, eager to be the little bird to carry 
Nan’s wish to his mother’s ear. 

• I would like a Christmas party at Chico- 
pee,” said Nan, her eyes dancing. 

A Christmas party at Chicopee ! Oh, 
Nan, that is n’t any present,” cried both 
boys, in a disappointed tone. 

told you it couldn’t be bought, but 
it ’s the only wish I have, just the same.” 

^^Oh, Lewis,’^ called Harry, hearing his 
12 


178 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


older brother coming down from his studio, 
in the third story, do you know wdiat 
Nan wants for a Christmas present ? 

No ; what is it ? ” said Lewis, counting 
over in his mind the amount he would have 
left from his allowance to expend on Christ- 
mas presents. 

A Christmas party at Chicopee,” shouted 
both boys. 

Well, that would be a Christmas present. 
Nan ! Let ’s have one ; I don’t see why 
not. I ’m sure mamma would be willing if 
your mother wanted the bother,” said Lewis, 
already learning the power of wealth. 

^AYhy, Lewis, I was only dreaming; of 
course it is n’t possible. Don’t say a word to 
your mother.” 

Possible ? ” said Lewis ; why, it ’s the 
easiest thing in the world ! Don’t see why 
not, if your father is willing to have the 
bother of us all. It would be the greatest 
lark ! ” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


179 


And in five minutes Lewis had laid Nan’s 
Christmas wish in his mother’s hands, with 
his confident air. 

Nan wants her Christmas present to be 
a Christmas party at Chicopee, mamma, but 
she thinks it impossible. Now, wouldn’t it 
be a lark for us all to go up, if Mrs. Ratclifie 
were willing ? We could see what the lake 
is like in winter.” 

Nan had refused to join in Lewis’s re- 
quest, and had fled to her room, frightened 
by the audacity of her cherished scheme ; 
but she was not allowed to remain there long, 
for soon Lewis and the boys were all calling 
for her. 

Nan, oh. Nan, mamma says she had 
thought of it herself. Think of that ! Oh, 
mamma always thinks of everything.” And 
then Nan was pulled into Mrs. Prince’s room, 
where Nan’s radiant face told how much the 
plan meant to her. 

Would you like it, dear, very much? 


180 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Of course I knew you would want to go 
home for the holidays, and I have been 
thinking how much we should miss our 
girlie, and it did occur to me that unless 
you preferred to go home and be at home 
alone, it would be a very jolly way to spend 
the holidays, to go to the camp, if your papa 
is willing to open it for us. It is seldom 
very cold in December, but there is plenty of 
ice on the lake to give the boys a taste of 
the winter sports.” 

Oh, such sport! ” said Nan. You can’t 
imagine the fun. Oh, boys 1 you will have 
the best Christmas holiday you ever knew.” 

From that day such excitement prevailed, it 
seemed as though the town house were hardly 
large enough to contain the happiness. 

Mrs. Prince’s mornings were spent in 
WTiting important letters and telegrams, and 
her afternoons in receiving answers. Then 
such preparations for cold days and nights, 
wet weather and windy weather. There 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


181 


were leggings and heavy stockings by the 
half dozens; sweaters and leather jackets, 
overshoes and moccasins, fur robes and 
heavy blankets. 

I should think we were going to the 
Arctic regions, mamma, and you were fitting 
out Peary’s expedition,” said Lewis. 

You boys have no idea of the require- 
ments for a good time in the New Hampshire 
forests, and I mean that you shall be dressed 
to fear no element.” 

But what do we want of moccasins, and 
overshoes too?” said Lewis, making an in- 
ventory of the articles spread about his 
mother’s room, when the outfit was nearly 
ready. 

Why, for snow-shoeing, of course,” said 
Nan. You can’t snow-shoe in overshoes.” 

Oh, supposing there should n’t be any 
snow, then our whole plan would be spoiled,” 
said -Lewis. 

No, indeed, it would n’t, for papa wrote 


182 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


yesterday that the ice was sixteen inches 
thick, and that he had had a toboggan slide 
made,” said Nan, glowing with anticipation 
of going home and the added pleasure of 
showing her friends what Chicopee could 
give them in winter. 

Mrs. Prince had so many secrets of her 
own that her eyes shone all the time and 
her mouth was wreathed in smiles, and both 
Nan and Lewis found it hard to imagine 
what further delights the fairy god- 
mother” could have in store for them, be- 
yond what seemed a more than full 
programme of winter sports ; but when at 
last on the twentieth the express-cart car- 
ried the equipment for their winter holiday, 
Lewis said, — 

“ Why, mamma, you Ve taken things 
enough for a dozen persons, — canned vege- 
tables, and soups, and fruit, and pillows and 
blankets. And why is Polly going? And 
here comes a carriage with Jill and Miss 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


183 


Eliot ! There, mamma, you have given Nan 
a surprise party.” 

There was Jill, with a long ulster on, 
and a fur cap pulled over her ears, and fur 
gloves in her lap, and Miss Eliot, wearing 
a big fur cape and a tight little turban, 
and both carrying shawl-straps and bags. 

All aboard for Chicopee ! ” cried the little 
boys, swinging up their new red toboggan 
caps with greatest glee, while Nan stood 
dumb with astonishment till Jill said, — 

Why, Nan, don’t you want me to go ? ” 
which brought Nan quite to her senses, and 
she flew at Jill, and hugged her almost to 
death, crying, — 

It ’s the best of ail ; but why did n’t you 
tell me ? ” 

^^That was Mrs. Prince’s secret, and there 
is more of it yet,” Jill whispered. 

And indeed there was, for when they 
reached the great Grand Central Station, 
there were Harold and Steve and Marshall 


184 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


and Ernest Lovering and Jimmie Hale, 
arrayed like Esquimaux. 

With one accord the boys rushed up to 
Nan, exclaiming in one voice, — 

Thank you so much for your invitation 
to the Christmas party, Nan.’' 

My invitation ? ” Nan answered, looking 
from one to the other. Why, I did n’t 
know anything about it. It ’s Mrs. Prince’s 
surprise party.” 

Then such jolly laughter as ran through 
the group, stopped babies crying, rested 
tired travelling mothers, and pleased even 
the crotchety old gentleman whose grip ” 
was marked with labels from every port in 
the world. 

That fur-wrapped group was the centre 
of attraction in the crowded waiting-room 
for the next fifteen minutes, while Marshall 
and Harold looked after luggage and tick- 
ets, counted checks, secured seats in the 

White Mountain Express,” and smoothed 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


185 


the path for Nan’s surprise party in a way 
that showed they had made the journey 
many times before. Mrs. Prince, who never 
fumed or fretted, sat quietly in a comfort- 
able corner, waiting until the young men 
should announce all the arrangements com- 
plete. It was Mrs. Prince’s way never to be 
disturbed by any trifles. But if we should 
lose the train, mamma,” Lewis would say. 
“Why, we could take another,” she would 
reply. 

But with Harold to attend to luggage and 
Marshall to buy tickets, there was no reason 
for any one to become anxious, and when the 
train rolled out ’ of the great station, the 
merry band were all aboard. 

To the little boys there was no part of 
the journey more interesting than the pas- 
sage under the great tunnels that bisect the 
city avenues; but Mrs. Prince watched for 
the broad, beautiful Hudson, with its wall of 
Palisades just touched by snow beyond. 


186 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


To think we shall be at Chicopee to- 
night ! ” said Nan to Jill, as the two girls 
looked out of one window, — Nan eager to 
see the brick buildings vanish and to follow 
the shore of the Hudson for many hours; 
Jill wondering what Nan’s world was like. 

Papa lived in Canada when he was a 
boy? yon know. Nan, and I have always 
longed to go to the ice carnival at Montreal.” 

It won’t be like that, Jill, but you can’t 
help liking it.” 

Then, as the journey progressed, and the 
young men had each chatted in turn with 
Mrs. Prince, and she herself seemed willing 
to be left alone, Harold slipped into a seat 
by Miss Eliot, and Lewis and Jill began to 
compare sketches and caricatures, while Mar- 
shall seemed happy to find that the younger 
boys had at last betaken themselves to the 
end of the car, and left Nan free to respond 
to his friendly confidences. 

The train sped on its way, with the cling- 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


187 


clang of the ponderous wheels singing a 
different song to every heart, but to Nan 
only the one joyous cry of Homeward 
Bound,” till Catskills and Hildebrands had 
melted into sky lines to the west, and the 
Berkshires had smiled benignly above gra- 
cious valleys, and then, as the day closed, 
they came at last to .that quiet, peaceful 
Connecticut which Nan loved. Then the 
car seemed hardly to be able to contain the 
girl’s spirit, as she sprang from side to side, 
pointing out to Jill first one familiar view 
and then another, Kearsarge and Mt. Wash- 
ington on the far horizon, and the crystal 
gleams of New Hampshire’s lovely lakes. 

The little boys were almost as wild in their 
glee as Nan herself, although to them there 
was something strange in the stretch of coun- 
try, powdered with the soft wool of the first 
snow-storms. It was a little hard for them 
to find the boundaries of their play-grounds, 
with ruffles on the fences,” as Wolcott said. 


188 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


But it was long after dark when at last 
the train whistled its hallo ” to the waiting 
friends at Chicopee village, and little Robbie 
and Paul had each caught many a nap in 
the vain endeavor to keep awake till half- 
past eight. 

Dear Mrs. Ratcliff e, driven by her house- 
wifely instincts from one corner of the ram- 
bling old farmhouse to the other, yet held by 
her motherly love to steal a look every now 
and then into Nan’s room, had exhausted all 
her fertility of resource in making the house 
attractive to the visitors, in spite of Mr. Rat- 
cliff e’s protestations. 

In each of the four great chambers the 
andirons were bright, big logs were burn- 
ing, and candlesticks were polished to their 
utmost. She said, half to herself, half to 
her spouse, who waited the railroad signal : 

Of course the boys can t go to camp 
to-night, and I shall have to use some of the 
feather-beds. Mrs. Prince and Wolcott are to 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


189 


have the south chamber, Miss Eliot the west 
room, Steve and Marshall the sitting-room 
chamber, Jill and Nan the Nest, bless the 
girlee ! and then Lewis and Harry in Marian’s 
room. The Count is so good as to share his 
room with Hal, and Robbie and Paul are in 
Rob’s room. Everything is quite comfort- 
able, and how lucky that Jonas’s wife could 
come to help in the kitchen, and Sallie 
Rhodes is so neat in the dining-room. There 
is the train, whistling down at the crossing.” 

But the little mother was talking only to 
empty air, for Mr. Ratcliffe and the Count 
had been gone two minutes on their way 
with wagon and carryall, to bring home 
the precious load ; and in fifteen minutes 
more, shouts of boys and laughter of girls, 
and the soft, caressing voice of dear Mrs. 
Prince were heard in the great square hall, 
which always before had seemed so vast, 
and yet now seemed as full as it could be 
with all this gay company. 


190 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Nan said not a word for a moment, as 
she clung to the little mother, with Kobbie 
pulling her sleeve and Paul stroking her 
hand ; and then she must lead Jill to her 
Nest, and show Miss Eliot the great din- 
ing-room with its huge brick chimney-piece, 
and the antlered heads of deer and caribou, 
the cabinet of bird’s eggs, her case of birds, 
and the mammoth hornet’s nest, — trophies 
of many a summer’s pilgrimage. 

Oh, can’t she see the new bunnies ? ” 
said Robbie. 

Oh, it ’s too late to go into the barn 
to-night, Robbie,” said his father ; and 
besides, they are as hungry as hunters, and 
supper is ready.” 

There is another day coming, and — ” 

And another and another and another,” 
said Nan, as she placed Jill beside her at the 
table and squeezed her hand ecstatically 
under the cloth, while Lewis on Jill’s other 
side said, — 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


191 


You Ve only begun with the fun. Wait 
till the ice-boat ’s out, and you get on your 
skates.’’ 

But you ’ve never been up here in winter 
before yourself,” said Jill. 

Oh, I know it, but I ’ve seen it all 
through Nan’s eyes ; ” and on the other side 
of Nan, Marshall was silently busy passing 
dishes. 

Yes, thanks, Marshall. Help yourself. 
This is my jelly; I put it up just before I 
went away.” 

Did you really. Nan ? ” said Marshall. 

Of course I did. Did n’t you know I 
could put up preserves ?” 

I did n’t know you cared anything about 
such things.” 

Why, Marsh, do you think I don’t help 
mother a bit ? I ’m not such a pig. I like 
cooking, but I despise sewing.” 

“ Such partridges! ” said Steve. ‘‘ Are we 
in time for the shooting ? ” 


192 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Just a week before close time; you can 
make the most of it, boys,” said Mr. Ratcliffe 
to the young men ; but Harold said, — 

We ’ve come up to give the young ladies 
a good time, you know.” 

Oh, Nan, is quite able to take care of the 
girls on the toboggan-slide, on snow-shoes or 
skates, Harold, and you can get a chance 
at a few brace of partridge,” said Mr. Rat- 
cliffe, with a merry look of mischief across 
the table at Mrs. Prince. 

With plans for the morrow, the evening 
slipped away, and it was nearly eleven 
o’clock when Mrs. RatclifEe gave the girls 
their candles, saying, You must remember 
your dreams, my dears, this first night. 
That is an old-fashioned superstition. I can 
remember the first time I slept in this old 
house, just after I w^as married. I can’t re- 
member my dream, but I know I was very 
happy, and I hope you will all be.” 

Mrs. Prince followed the girls up, and the 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


193 


white dimity-hung chamber was so comfort- 
able and cosey, Wolcott’s baby curls were so 
fair, and his face so round on the pillows, 
she knew that her dreams would be for the 
future of her boys. 

Margaret, in the chintz room that looked 
to the west, had, perhaps, some dreams of 
her own which she still could not reveal to 
the mad-cap girls, who left her at the 
threshold. 

Nan and Jill had no thought of dreams, 
but would have talked till morning, had not 
a warning knock from her mother stilled 
them to dreamless sleep at midnight. 


13 


CHAPTER XI. 


NAN AND MAESHALL DISCOYEK A KOMANCE. 
ET US go up to the mountain gully, 



Nan, where we used to walk when 
you were a little girl,” said Marshall, when 
they had been but a few days at the farm, 
and Lewis had taken his Kodak to the barn- 
yard to take some snap-shots at the pets and 
little boys in their picturesque winter cos- 
tumes. The Count had invited Jill and Miss 
Eliot to visit his Hermitage, the round tower 
on the hill, where he spent his summers, and 
which held more than one souvenir of Russia. 

No programme had been arranged for this 
special afternoon, and Steve and the others 
were all in camp, leaving Marshall free to 
obtain Nan’s companionship if he could, for 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


195 


Marshall had found in the pleasant inter- 
course of the farm-house a happy reminis- 
cence of the summer days when he had first 
come to Chicopee, before Mr. Ratclifie had 
planned the camp and introduced an alien 
element into the friendship of himself and 
Nan. 

He was then a rather awkward, slim 
boy of twelve, and Nan a robust girl, not 
quite ten ; and how delightful had been their 
plays and strolls through woods and dells, 
by brooks and lake, in search of treasures 
rich and rare to the city boy ! What 
wonders they had discovered, what treasures 
brought home, of moss and fungus, sticks 
and stones, dear only to themselves ! 

He had played so condescendingly all 
kinds of games that were not quite boyish, 
to please his little playmate, yet to his 
own amusement, acting out Nan’s queer 
fancies, for days at a time, when he would 
be an enchanted Prince, or Hamlet’s ghost, 


196 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


or Sinbad the sailor, or Ali Baba ; and then 
she would reward him by playing baseball, 
or marbles, or hocky, or pitch-knives, until 
Mrs. Rat cliff e would say that Nan was a 
boy one day and Marshall a girl the next. 

But those days were long ago, before Lewis 
came, and Marshall was not sure that Nan 
would go back to the good old days, even for 
one afternoon. Great was his pleasure when 
she entered joyfully into the plan. If Mar- 
shall were conscious that he was six years 
older, it seemed that Nan was less so. 
When she came to the top of their first 
long hill, she exclaimed, — 

Let 's race down here. The black birch 
over there is the goal. One two, three, slam 
bang ! ” and, warned by a recent experience, 
Marshall dared not give her the three paces 
of grace,” as he used to, and, flying, she like 
Atalanta, he as the runner from Marathon, 
they covered the snow-laid road, Marshall 
coming in by two paces ahead. Nan hatless 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


197 


and mittenless, measuring her length at the 
foot of the tree, both laughing and breathless. 

Then Marshall had to go back for the cap 
and mittens, and dared not say the little gal- 
lant speech which was on his lips, for fear 
of spoiling the fun, till Nan said, — 

Oh, Marsh, don’t you hate to grow up ? 
But we are growing up. Now, when we do 
these things nowadays, it is just as much 
fun, in a way, as it used to be ; but yet there 
is always something outside of it that makes 
it different, — the feeling that there is a 
lot of work for somebody to do. Don’t 
you remember last summer when I could n’t 
make up my mind to go away ? It was n’t 
that I was a bit afraid of being home- 
sick, but something made me feel that it 
would never be the same again. And it 
won’t. Since I have seen all those people 
down there crowded up together, dirty and 
hungry, I feel as if they have a right to some 
of it.” r 


198 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Oh, Nan, don’t spoil it,” said Marshall. 

Your little bit of a world spread ever so 
thin would n’t give them a bite, and you 
would only make yourself less happy. It is 
just because you and I and Hal and Steve 
have got so much out of all this, that we can 
help the people we come in touch with, as 
we may. If we had done things in a half- 
hearted way, we should n’t be able to do so 
much as we may by and by, when the colony 
is started. I read somewhere last winter 
it ’s no use looking after the valves, we must 
just keep on breathing; and just because 
somebody else has heart disease, that ’s no 
reason why we should n’t let our hearts 
pump the very best blood they can to our 
veins and brains.” 

Oh, Marshall, you moralize like a doctor. 
When you read things, do you just pick out 
the special passages marked arteries and 
valves ? I see now why you are in a hurry 
to practise.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


199 


I can’t wait, Nan; but I’ve promised 
my father that I will finish out this year at 
college, and then go into the medical school. 
He thinks business is going to be better by 
and by, and there is n’t any real need of my 
cutting the course, but I am impatient. 
But, Nan, don’t be in too much of a hurry 
about the nursing, will you ? ” 

And why not ? If you are impatient to 
get to work, when there is no need of it, 
how do you suppose I feel with my hands 
tied ? ” 

Your hands tied. Nan ? Why, you are 
as free as a bird ! You don’t know what it 
is to be bound by anything. Do you think 
you can get over this wall ? ” 

Oh, Marshall, what a joke ! Can I get 
over this wall ? Since when have I been 
too infirm to get over a chip wall?” said 
Nan, indignantly. 

It ’s only because your dresses seem to 
be a little longer than they used to be,” said 


200 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Marshall, apologetically, as Nan started to 
climb over the wall, when all at once Nan 
exclaimed, — 

The plaguy old thing ! Mother has 
made it two inches too long, and I ’ve got 
it caught in the rock. Can you help me, 
Marshall ? Talk about being bound and tied 
hand and foot ? Nothing ties a girl like this 
kind of thing, and I was just going to vault 
over so easily. Oh, Marshall, see that wood- 
pecker ! ” 

Following the direction of Nan’s finger, 
Marshall saw poised on the back of the 
trunk of a fallen tree a jaunty woodpecker, 
evidently scratching for the frozen remains 
of some belated grubs. Going noiselessly to 
the end of the tree. Nan knowingly peeped 
beneath to discover that he had made for 
himself a snug hole on the under side away 
from the snow and the wind ; and to verify 
it she rapped with her knuckles on the end 
of the tree, and be disappeared beneath. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


201 


much as to say/’ said Nan, ^^^You 
bothering creature, you may wait till another 
spring before I give you a sight of me again.’ ” 
By various cross cuts where Nan wished 
to explore certain fox-holes and mud-frogs’ 
haunts and other familiar places, they 
reached only after a long two hours’ walk 
the shadow of the mountain. To the east 
and northeast the snow-covered plains sloped 
rapidly to the lake region, and beyond on 
the far horizon stretched the beautiful moun- 
tain ranges of the White Hills, touched by 
the glorious, reflected light of the sun going 
down in the west. 

Why, Marshall, the sun is going down 
and we are two hours from home ! ” ex- 
claimed Nan, in dismay. 

By the straight road we could make it 
in an hour and a half, but it is a good deal 
later than I thought. We ought not to 
stay a moment ; we must walk and run till 
we get into the high-road, and if we can’t 


202 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


make the turn before dark, we shall have to 
wait for the moon,” said Marshall, looking 
anxiously at the sinking sun. 

I don’t think it will take us more than 
an hour and a half, but it will be pitch dark 
long before that. These days are so short. 
I ought not to have led you so much out of 
the way,” said Nan. 

I ought to have taken better care of 
you,” said Marshall, with an exasperatingly 
protecting look at Nan, who was striding on 
out of patience with herself. 

Taken care of me ! I guess I can take care 
of myself ; but I ought to have had more sense. 
Have you got any matches, Marshall ? ” 

Yes, a match-box full,” said Marshall, 
pulling out a silver box and opening it to 
assure himself. 

Well, if worse comes to worse, we can 
build a fire and wait for the moon to rise; 
but they will be frightened, or rather mamma 
will and Mrs. Prince.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


203 


In spite of their rapid strides, which quick- 
ened into a run down hill, darkness covered 
the landscape long before they reached the 
turn in the road which led to the village; 
and although Nan kept on perversely for 
a time, Marshall persuaded her that they 
were running a risk of losing their path, 
and that they would better build a fire 
and wait for the moon to rise in another 
hour. 

We ’ll strike a match and look for some 
brush,” said Marshall; and, both working 
briskly, they had burned only haK a dozen 
matches before they had a good heap of 
brushwood gathered, and there was soon a 
bright fire crackling beside the road. 

It will keep ofi unwelcome visitors, and 
keep us warm if it won’t give us something 
to eat,” said Nan, as they tramped up and 
down on opposite sides of it, like sentinels 
around a bivouac. 

What a trump you are. Nan ! How do 


204 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


you suppose the little BrinkerhofP would 
behave at such a time V’ 

Oh, Jill would scream a little at first, 
and then settle down to doing something 
sensible. Of course she is n’t so strong as 
I am ; but she has lots of pluck underneath 
her squeals. Don’t you like Jill, Marsh ? ” 

I like her well enough ; she is n’t my 
kind of a girl, exactly. How did you happen 
to be such friends ?” 

Why, she was so nice to me at school at 
first, and then she is so quick and clever. 
Now we are great chums. She is quick-witted 
and I am sure-footed, so you see we make a 
pretty good pair. I am sorry you don’t like 
her, though,” said Nan, in a disappointed tone. 

I do like her well enough. I don’t 
suppose I ’ve got to like her as well as you 
do, just because you like her ? ” 

Of course not ; you don’t know her so 
well, and then I don’t think you and Jill 
would ever be chums, as we are. Now, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


205 


Lewis and Jill get on splendidly, for they 
both see the funny side of things and like 
to sketch and make caricatures, and in 
spite of her seeming so flippant, she is just 
as determined, and is going to study art, so 
as to illustrate books,” said Nan, in defence 
of her friend. 

I know somebody else is determined to 
do something, — nursing or — ” 

Oh, yes, I Ve made up my mind, too. 
How do you like Miss Eliot, Marshall ? ” 
There ! you are asking a leading ques- 
tion ; ” and Marshall, adding a few more sticks 
to the fire, began to laugh immoderately. 

I don’t see what you are laughing at, 
unless they told you about my falling in love 
with her.” 

^^Your falling in love with her? Well, 
that is a joke. Nan. I can’t conceive of your 
falling in love — with a girl.” 

Well, I did ; but if that is n’t it, what 
are you laughing at ? ” 


206 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


I was thinking of Hal. He is just 
awfully in love with her. Down at the 
camp the other night, we had more fun. 
Hal spouted poetry, and talked such nonsense 
Steve and I nearly rolled off our chairs, — 
her eyes and her hair and her voice and her 
good deeds ; why. Saint Lucy, Saint Agatha, 
Saint Ursula, none of them can hold a 
candle to Saint Margaret. No wonder her 
hair is so bright ; it ’s an aureole or halo ! ” 
And Marshall threw back his head and 
laughed till the owls hooted in reply, and 
Nan stood still, staring at him, then ex- 
claimed, — 

Do you really think they ’ll be engaged ? ” 

They ’ll be engaged if Harold has his 
way, but girls are queer ducks,” Marshall 
replied. 

“ Humph ! ” sniffed Nan ; then we ’ll have 
Marian and Herbert all over again. It is 
very tiresome ! Hark ! there are sleigh-bells.” 

Some one coming to look us up. We ’ll 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


207 


put on more head light/’ said Marshall, 
and when the sleigh came in sight it was 
a single sleigh with two occupants, Harold 
and Miss Eliot. 

Hal drew up his horse in some surprise 
and confusion, calling out, — 

^^What are you two doing out here so 
late?” 

Waiting for the moon,” said Marshall, 
while Nan began to laugh immoderately. 

“ Nan, get in here, and Marshall can hang 
on behind, and I ’ll turn around. Our horse 
knows the way without a lantern.” 

Did n’t you come out for us ? ” asked 
Nan, who had regained composure. 

^^Not exactly, though uncle asked me to 
keep a lookout. Aunt Mary and Mrs. Prince 
were worried, but your father said, ^ Nan 
always lands on her feet, and Marshall is 
no fool.’ But how did you happen to be so 
belated ? ” 

“ We were tramping over some of our old 


208 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


playground and did n’t notice how far from 
home we were,” said Nan, adding, Where 
were you going, if you weren’t going to 
find us ? ” 

Oh, I was going to show Miss Eliot the 
mountain by moonlight,” said Hal. 

Nan gave an incredulous Ah ! ” and did 
not speak another word all the way home, 
though Miss Eliot talked to Marshall. There 
were scoldings and kisses when they got home, 
but Nan was too hungry to care for anything 
so much as the baked beans and brown bread 
that had been kept comfortably hot for them. 

As Harold and Miss Eliot drove off again, 
Nan said suggestively to Marshall, — 

The mountain is lovely by moonlight, 
humph ! ” and half an hour later, she teased 
Jill to go to bed, complaining of being too 
tired to sit up for games or music, as indeed 
she was ; but when both girls sat upon the 
floor unbuttoning their boots, after the man- 
ner of girls, Nan burst forth, — 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


209 


Well, Jill, what do you think is going 
to happen, but that Cousin Hal is falling in 
love with Margaret Eliot ! ” 

Indeed, I Ve known that all the time,” 
answered Miss Jill. 

Nan replied, Why did n't you say so be- 
fore, then ? ” throwing one boot into a remote 
corner with emphasis. 

I did n’t think it was just polite when 
he is your cousin. If she shouldn’t like 
him, it might hurt your feelings,” said Jill, 
insinuatingly. 

I guess if she knew what a splendid 
fellow Cousin Hal is, she would be glad to 
marry him. But, oh, dear, I went through 
so much with Marian, and then she did n’t 
have any bridesmaids.” 

I do hope she ’ll have bridesmaids, and 
ask us, don’t you. Nan ? ” said Jill, reflec- 
tively brushing her curly pate. 

^^I think it is rather previous, and then 
you and I would n’t match well at all. I ’m 

14 


210 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


SO big, and you are so little ; but then she 
would be sure to think it nonsense. Work- 
ing among the poor seems to make girls so 
unsentimental. I am so sleepy, Jill. Good- 
night.” 

But as she was just dozing into a delicious 
dream, where wedding-cake and baked beans, 
the moon and a bonfire, played at cross- 
purposes, Jill woke her up to ask, — 

Shall you call her Meg, or Margaret, or 
Madge ? ” 

Oh, dear, I ’ll call her — and you, too, 
Jill — a nightmare ! 


CHAPTER XII. 


CAMP CHICOPEE IS TO FOUJTD A COLONY. 



0, I ’ll steer myself ; Jill, you hold 


^ Wolcott on ; then Lewis and Harry ; 
and I will get on last, and keep .you 
straight.” 

Nan stood behind the Canadian toboggan, 
at the top of the steep slide which terminated 
in the frozen lake itself, and directed the load- 
ing of the passengers, in compliance with her 
own knowledge and experience. 

Oh, oh, I ’m afraid ! ” screamed Jill, as, 
viewed from the top, it looked a perilous 
descent indeed ; and her courage waned when, 
fastened securely in the front of the flat sled, 
with only Wolcott between her and the pre- 
cipitous decline, she screamed shrilly, — 


Oh, don’t start yet ! ” 


212 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Now, don’t be a goose, Jill ! hold on 
tight, here we go, — one, two, three ! ” With 
a whir and a whizz the long Canadian sled 
shot down the ice-track and off at the bottom 
on to the lake itself, where it was finally 
stopped by a snow barricade, which had been 
thrown up for the purpose. 

In a moment all were on their feet, no 
one. shouting louder than Jill, — 

Oh, is n’t that fine ? Let ’s try it again ! 
But let me steer. Nan.” 

There is n’t much steering to do on 
the slide, but just the same I would n’t risk 
Wolcott’s neck with you or Lewis,” said 
Nan, who could not help showing a little 
superiority. 

Let ’s go down by ourselves, then, 
Jill,” said Lewis, and we ’ll take turns 
at steering.” 

‘‘You know what happened to Jack and 
Jill,” said Nan, laughing, as they climbed to 
the top of the slide again. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


213 


Yes, but it happened once too often. I 
don’t propose to fall down this hill. I ’m 
going down just the way we did with you. 
Come, Lewis, let ’s try it,” said Jill, pertly. 

There was a cheer from the little boys as 
the two whizzed over the track ; but as they 
reached the bottom, Lewis forgot to steer 
toward the snow wall, and the toboggan, 
lightly loaded, slewed round and round like 
a tee-totum, leaving Lewis rolling over on 
the ice, and Jill clutching what she called 
the dasher,” while the end flew up in the 
air. In a second Lewis was on his feet and 
extricated Jill from her position ; but the 
youngsters and Nan would not let them 
escape without ridicule, and Jill refused to 
go down again that morning ; but they all 
brought out their skates from the bank and 
challenged one another to a race to the Camp 
Island. 

At skating neither Lewis nor Jill was a 
novice, for the skating on the pond in their 


214 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


great city park had been a pastime of several 
winters, and even Harry and Wolcott could 
do very well, though Nan gave each a hand, 
while Lewis skated on with Jill, and it was 
not long before the wooded island, still green 
with its firs and hemlocks, was close at hand. 

Fires burned on the shore, and smoke 
came from the pavilion, showing that some 
of the party had already gathered there; and 
in response to their halloos Marshall and two 
other boys came out brandishing axes, to 
tell of a morning spent in gathering brush 
and firewood and assisting in the prepa- 
ration for a camp luncheon, to which Nan 
also turned her attention, for a horse-sled 
was seen just leaving the shore, bearing Mrs. 
Prince, Mrs. Ratcliffe, and Miss Eliot. Hal 
and Steve had yielded to the temptation 
of partridge-shooting, and were expected to 
appear soon with bags full of game. 

Sheltered by its evergreens, the little camp 
seemed to possess a perennial summer charm. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


215 


The pine needles beneath the thin snow 
almost sung a welcome to their tread, and 
Nan said that even the chipmunks and 
woodchucks came out of their holes to greet 
their summer friends. 

We ’ll leave them some Christmas pres- 
ents, as they do the birds in Sweden,” said 
Jill, hopping about from stone to stone, and 
perching herself on the trunk of a fallen 
tree, with her old fondness for agile feats. 

Oh, it ’s the best kind of a picnic I ever 
heard of. Cold ? Why, who could ever think 
of being cold up here ? To be sure, I am 
rolled in layers of clothing, till I am sure I 
must look like an Esquimau, but I am as 
warm as toast.” 

Just the same, you ’ll be glad to have 
luncheon inside where there are two open 
fires going,” said Nan, coming out with a 
kettle of water to set on the cook’s fire, 
without her cap or jacket, yet still aglow 
from the exercise of skating down. 


216 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


How long before luncheon, Nan ? ” Lewis 
asked, dreamily making notes for winter 
sketches. 

Oh, half an hour. The boys and Marsh 
have got things in fine order, and I am set- 
ting the table. My mother and yours are on 
the way. Why don’t you take Jill down 
to the studio and show her your Den ? 

think I will. Would you like to see 
my dark room, Jill ? ” 

So Nan set the little boys to work; and 
she herself with Marshall’s help had done 
much that Mrs. Katcliffe expected to do, 
when that lady arrived. 

But Nan said, Now, mother dear, you 
and Mrs. Prince are as cold as you can be, 
and you must sit right by the fire while we 
unpack the luncheon hamper. I know just 
how to do it all.” 

Mrs. Prince confessed to being a little 
cold, but Miss Eliot’s deft hands were ready 
to help, and before the sportsmen came a 


NAN IN THE CITY. 217 

plenteous lunch was ready, with hot coffee 
and steaming broth. 

With bags full of game and hearty appe- 
tites, they did justice to the meal. And after 
that Jill and Miss Eliot had a chance to see 
some camp drill, as each boy with decorous 
precision left the table, plate, cup, saucer, 
knife, and fork in hand, and deposited them 
in a huge wash-boiler of water, and in 
an incredibly short time every remnant of 
the feast was removed; the boys and Nan 
washing and wiping and replacing the dishes, 
like soldiers on duty. 

Jill laughed contagiously. It reminds 
me of the Kitchen Garden. Did you ever 
see it, Mrs. Prince? Somebody took me 
there once, — to see the children playing 
with tables and dishes, being trained to do 
housework. It was the cunningest thing to 
see them. At a given signal each one sings 
a little song and lays a knife and fork in 
place, then sings another song and puts on 


218 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


plates and mugs ; then takes them off and 
carries them away to the tune of a march ; 
and then the washing and wiping, all with 
funny little verses. Did they learn like 
that ? See Wolcott wiping those knives ; he 
never does anything at home.’’ 

Oh, no, that is only Camp Chicopee disci- 
pline. Wolcott makes a specialty of knives, 
but Harry can wipe saucers,” said Mrs. 
Prince, laughing ; then, turning to Miss 
Eliot, she said : How has that Kitchen 
Garden work progressed ? Do you use it 
still ? ” 

Oh, yes, it ’s part of our kindergarten 
training ; it is so helpful to the children of 
the poor.” 

As the work went on, seeming almost 
play to the boys in the division of labor, 
Mrs. Prince asked Harold to sit by her while 
she unfolded a little plan of her own. 

Both of you,” she said, beckoning Mar- 
garet to a seat on the other side. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


219 


“ You know I am a person of whims. I 
suppose if I were poor I should not let them 
take such possession of me. It was a whim 
of mine to have Nan in Brooklyn. I think 
it has been a very satisfactory whim. It 
was a whim of mine to bring you all up 
here, to please the child. Now it is a whim 
of mine to do something else, unless you two 
wise and steady ones call it Utopian. I want 
to buy some land up here, perhaps a farm, 
perhaps an island, and I want to bring some 
of your poor boys and girls up here next 
summer, and not give them just the fun, 
but some of the profits, of the life that has 
made Nan what she is. Now there must be 
many of those children in your slums, Harold, 
that are sent off by the Fresh Air Fund, 
who would like to stay on through the fall 
and have good homes, learn to plant and to 
make hay, to take care of chickens and stock. 
There would be others for whom two weeks 
would be enough, — the real children of the 


220 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


slums, without a wish for anything else ! 
There must be mothers, widows with boys, 
who would like it ; there must be girls who 
could learn to be neat and handy, to make 
butter and preserves, who would go back to 
good city homes as servants later. Now, 
why can’t I buy one of these abandoned farms 
that we hear of ? Why can’t I get some 
help from you girls in the Settlement, and 
you young men, in finding worthy boys and 
girls, and then perhaps in finding some of 
your helpers who would take turns in giving 
a month in the summer ? I should of course 
get a farmer and his wife to take care of 
the place. Is it quixotic ? Hal, tell me ! ” 
Harold, who had been both startled 
and astonished by the proposition, almost 
stammered, — 

Quixotic ! No, indeed, my dear Mrs. 
Prince, but very expensive.” 

Expensive, yes, I suppose so ; but those are 
my extravagances. I don’t wear diamonds. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


221 


I have given up fashionable entertainments. 
If the expense is the only drawback, let us 
set about it at once, so that when summer 
comes we can have the Chicopee Colony 
going. Come, Harold, say you will help 
me,’’ pleaded Mrs. Prince, in her not-to-be- 
denied way, which was almost too convincing 
to Harold, who had, however, some scruples 
yet to be overcome. 

I should have to talk it over with uncle.” 

Of course. We will take him into our 
confidence at once ; and here he comes,” said 
the lady, turning to Mr. Ratclifie, who had 
too much of the temperament of the en- 
thusiast himself to discourage any plan of 
the kind proposed by Mrs. Prince, however 
utopian it might appear to other people ; 
and he said, — 

I know just the farm, half-way between 
our place and the Count’s Hermitage. It 
belongs to a man and his wife, who are 
anxious to sell and go out West, to join a 


222 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


son who is doing well there. It is a fair 
piece of land, and with proper care could 
be made to yield produce enough to feed 
quite a colony. I should n’t be surprised, 
Mrs. Prince, if the Count and his man would 
be willing to help you. Of course you don’t 
mean to turn farmer yourself ? ” asked Mr. 
Ratcliffe, laughingly, regarding the luxurious 
lady before him. 

Not exactly. I fear that is not my forte. 
But I should like to make it possible for 
others to carry out such a scheme as yours 
for rich boys for the benefit of the poor. 
By and by, in another year Stephen and 
Marshall could take Hal’s place at Camp 
Chicopee, could they not ? ” 

Oh, yes,” said Mr. Ratclifie ; we prac- 
tically had to give up Herbert last summer, 
and Steve did his part then. Yes, we could 
spare Harold.” 

And do you think the Count would like 
to come in ? ” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


223 


With all his heart. Since Paul came 
he has thought more and more of the poor 
among whom the little fellow lived, and 
especially those noble girls who are working 
in the Settlement.’’ 

Good ! then he is surely our ally. Has 
he any idea of farming ? ” 

^^He and his man Ivan have a thorough 
knowledge of that, and then, too, I think I 
know of an excellent woman who could be 
found to keep house. How many children 
should you want to have here at a time ? ” 
Oh, I should start with half a dozen 
girls and half a dozen boys, and have them 
trained to work and play. I would leave 
the selection to Harold and Miss Eliot, for 
they know the children so well. But would 
these people, this farmer and his wife, be 
willing to sell the house and furniture ? ” 
^^Oh, you wouldn’t want much of the 
furniture, but the essentials you could keep. 
Then you would want to have some painting 


224 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


done, and one or two partitions knocked 
down, to give a good dormitory for the boys, 
and one or two put up, to give small rooms 
for the girls. Then you will want a good 
large dining-room and a work-shop.” 

Splendid ; just the thing ! Let us set 
right about it ! ” 

We will go early to-morrow to see the 
Carters, but you may be sure they will be 
glad to sell, for they could not dream of 
having a purchaser in midwinter ; and you 
need not offer too high a price ; ’’and naming 
a figure which he thought sufficient for the 
Carter farm, he reminded the party that it 
was growing late ; so, leaving the older boys 
in camp, with many injunctions about fires, 
Mr. Ratcliffe packed the ladies and Wolcott 
on to the horse-sled and set off to cross the 
lake to the farm ; while Nan and Jill, with 
Harry, put on their skates, and were sur- 
prised to see Miss Eliot and Harold skating 
ahead of them, deep in discussion of the 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


225 


proposed plan, which was fraught with so 
much good for their joint work. 

‘‘ It seems too good to be true/' said Mar- 
garet. I know a dozen whom I would 
like to bring up.” 

And I two dozen/’ said Harold ; but 
are you willing to come too ? ” 

^Mf I can be of any use.” 

And then they skated off, while Nan 
stayed to favor Harry’s slower movements. 

As it proved that the farmer and his wife 
were only too glad to sell their property 
to Mrs. Prince, and her lowest price seemed 
to them a fortune, Mr. Katcliffe and the 
Count went immediately to work to survey 
the farm, and to consider its possibilities for 
vegetable and grain growing, and Mrs. Prince 
and Mrs. Ratcliff e were allowed to explore 
all the hidden recesses of the farmhouse, and 
to plan among themselves the disposition of 
much useless lumber and accumulated rub- 


15 


226 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


bish of generations, which Mrs. Prince in- 
deed would have found impossible even to 
consider, had not Mrs. Ratcliffe belonged to 
the class of practical women who can plan 
and contrive even without a bank account, 
and how much with the inspiration of a 
bountiful purse at command ! 

What are we to do, now that I have 
bought it ? I feel as though I had dravui 
an elephant,” said Mrs. Prince, after one of 
these visits. 

Oh, we must wait until the owners go 
away, and then it will be easy to rid our- 
selves of what we don’t need and avail 
ourselves of what we need.” 

But I must go home next week,” said 
Mrs. Prince, for once finding that city 
methods of despatch could not be used here. 

Leave it all to Mr. Ratclifie and the 
Count, and they will be delighted to have 
something to occupy them this winter ; then 
come up in April and give your commands 


NAN IN THE CITY. 227 

to your farmer and housekeeper for a spring 
garden.” 

I think that is what I shall have to do.” 

And Mrs. Prince, with confidence in her 
country friends, confined herself to the glit- 
tering generalities of the great project, very 
certain that Mr. Ratcliffe and the Count 
could battle with the details, and looking 
forward herself to the carrying out of a 
scheme which should bring the greatest good 
to the greatest number. 

With sport and merriment the days went 
all too quickly by, a heavy storm but adding 
to the enjoyment of the house and camp 
party, bringing out the snowshoes, and 
spurring the boys to the manufacture of 
Swedish kees ; and on New Year’s eve came 
the moonlight sleigh-ride, and after the 
sleigh-ride a hot supper and a jolly Virginia 
Reel and blindman’s bufE. 

The Christmas tree, which had been brightly 
beautiful for the little boys, still kept its 


228 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


place of honor in front of the large east 
window, with its hundred candles, its myriad 
dazzling beauties of silver and gilt, tinsel 
and paper, its never-ending surprises in the 
shape of candy boxes and gifts ; for of 
course the trimmings for a Christmas tree 
were among the secrets of Mrs. Prince’s 
wonderful packing for this visit, and, as a 
souvenir of this Christmas party, each of the 
young people had received a pin in the form 
of a pair of silver skates, with a gold C ” 
as a badge of Chicopee set in the centre. 

It was at its last lighting on New Year’s 
eve, when there was a faint feeling among 
the children that there might he still some 
surprises under its green boughs, that in 
their midst appeared two figures, — an old 
man with the bent figure and hoary beard of 
the Old Year, bearing on his shoulders a tiny 
boy with golden curls, carrying a quiver of 
rosy parchment rolls. 

The Old Year and the New ! ” cried Jill, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


229 


clapping her hands and pivoting on one foot 
in delight at the happy device. A hush fell 
on the company, as the boy was placed in 
the centre of the room, and the old man, 
waving a melancholy good-by, tottered 
slowly from the room. 

Come back. Old Year,” called Harold, 
we are not through with you. ’T is only 
ten o’clock, and perhaps we have something 
to thank you for.” 

Thus bidden, the old man returned, and 
the Infant Year, like a very human child, 
slipped into Mrs. Prince’s lap, the others 
gathering around the figure of the Old Year 
with the heartiness of children at a play, 
and the earnestness of grown people before 
an oracle. 

Fixing them each with the eye of the 
Ancient Mariner, the Old Year put his ques- 
tions in turn ; first to Harold, — 

Have you anything to thank me for, 
young man ? ” 


230 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


A degree and an office, and some good 
slices of fortune. I Ve more to ask of the 
boy.” 

Oh, yes, I suppose so. A wife and a 
home ? You are never satisfied. And you. 
Master Marshall. Any thanks from you ? 
What did I do for you?” 

Oh, you gave us the Prince ton- Yale 
game. ’T was good of you.” 

Humph ! try for better things next 
time,” said the sage. Then of Nan the 
masker asked, — 

And, Miss Wildbird, any favors we 
have given you ? ” 

Oh, yes, too many to count. There ’s 
Paul, and my school, and Jill, and Miss 
Eliot.” 

And you. Miss Gipsy, I suppose I did 
nothing for you except to cut your hair.” 

Oh, yes, you gave me Nan.” 

Then of Steve : You, young man, wear 
not a grateful air; have you any bone to 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


231 


pick with me ? I gave you a beard and a 
gown.” 

Yes, and ruined my eyes, and spoiled my 
digestion ; but you ’ve taught me patience and 
some other virtues,” said Stephen, making a 
mock face, as Lewis came to the front, and 
thought he ought to be grateful for having 
passed his preliminaries,” and I ’ll look 
to the new year to work off my conditions.” 

Margaret was grateful for Chicopee, and 
Mrs. Prince for happiness, and the Count for 
Paul, while Mrs. Ratcliffe was grateful for 
the goodness of her daughters. 

Then all laughed over the foolishness of 
their answers, saying that they were much 
like the old woman’s three wishes which be- 
gan and ended with “ Black Pudding.” 

And the Old Year revealed himself as Mr. 
Ratcliffe, saying, — 

Little New Year, I hope you have more 
wisdom in your quiver of promises than they 
have shown in their records.” 


232 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


^^Are your promises written in the sand 
or on a rock, little New Year ? ’’ asked 
Margaret, as the little man handed her a 
rosy parchment scroll. am sure they 

must be written in the stars, for not a word 
is on mine but ^ Love and Hope.’ ” 

It must be the white paper which each 
New Year gives us on which to begin again 
the record for the future. We must fill 
it for ourselves. This is, you see, tinged 
with the rosy tint of Love and Hope^ and 
promises for you something sweet,” said 
Mrs. Prince. 

And yours. Nan,” asked Margaret, blush- 
ing. 

Youth and Faith, and the blank sheet to 
be filled by Miss Eighteen,” said Nan, look- 
ing at Lewis’s watchword. Watch and Work. 
‘‘ Just what you need. Master Easy-Going.” 

To Marshall but the single word Patience. 

I don’t think you needed that,” said Steve, 
looking at his own. Fortitude. 


NAT^ IN THE CITY. 


233 


Jill’s was prettiest of all, “ To make a 
little sunshine in the world ; ” but she chose 
to think she was never taken seriously. 

These are all the promises you give us, 
naughty boy, and leave the rest to us. At 
least you have a fair outside,” said Harold, 
catching the boy upon his shoulder, and 
saying, ^^The New Year will make Wolcott 
a better present than all the rest ; he T1 make 
him eight years old. It will do something 
for me too; it will give me — ” 

The rest was whispered in Nan’s ear, 
which sent her flying across the room to 
kiss Margaret, and say, The New Year 
will give me a new cousin.” 

And it will give me a new helper,” said 
Mrs. Prince, kissing Margaret too ; and then 
the New Year’s party became an occasion for 
congratulating both Harold and Margaret, 
and Marshall wore an air of I told you 
so,” and Nan settled the question Jill had 
asked so inopportunely by saying, — 


234 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


My Chicopee party has been a great 
success. It has made Margaret one of us, 
and it has laid the corner-stone of a new 
Camp Chicopee Colony. Three cheers for 
Mrs. Prince, the Old Year, and the New 
Year ! ” 


CHAPTER XIII. 


FIVE YEARS LATER. — HOW NAN PAID HER 
DEBT TO MRS. PRINCE. 

I T was in the bare reception-room of a city 
hospital one gray spring morning that 
a handsome blond young man paced up and 
down restlessly, and impatient of the delay 
in response to his imperative call for one of 
the trained nurses. 

He was a young fellow just past his 
majority, with an all-conquering, self-satisfied 
air which told of a comfortable fortune and 
a happy disposition. That he was just now 
troubled, no one could fail to see, for his 
smooth brow was momentarily wrinkled 
with anxiety, and his hands played ner- 
vously with hat and cane. That his sense 
of harmony and good taste was offended by 


236 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


the room in which he was obliged to pass 
fifteen minutes, was also betrayed by the 
scorn with which he regarded the monu- 
mental effigies of the patrons of the in- 
stitution which lined the walls, and the 
geometric dulness of the carpet beneath his 
feet. 

He must have walked at least twenty times 
up and down the room before a tall, hand- 
some girl, wearing the uniform of the trained 
nurse, entered, and with a firm yet quiet step 
came half-way to meet him, with outstretched 
hands, and the one word, Lewis.’' 

Oh, Nan, how good it is to see you ! 
You have grown so tall and handsome in a 
year. I like the dress, but I hate the idea 
of your nursing ; but Wolcott is desperately 
ill, mother is frantic, and wants you to come 
at once, as soon as you can. Typhoid pneu- 
monia they call it. I landed only last night. 
Have not even seen Jill, for we did not leave 
Wolcott at all last night.” 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


237 


Why did n’t you send for me at once ? ” 
Mamma thought she would like to take 
care of him herself, and has for days, and 
would not give him up to any one but 
you. Dr. Harper is attending him, and I 
see that Marshall is his assistant. Can 
you come at once. Nan ? The carriage is 
waiting.” 

Yes. I will go to the office first ; then, if 
you will let me go in this dress, I will not 
keep you waiting. Poor little Wolcott ! ” 
What a flood of recollections even the 
straps and cushions of dear Mrs. Prince’s 
carriage brought to Nan’s heart, — of happy 
hours and pleasure trips, of drives with the 
little invalid Daisy, of concerts and plays, 
and visits to poor and sick ! But never yet 
had its errand been one fraught with evil or 
sorrow to Mrs. Prince herself. For a moment 
Nan’s own heart stood still, as Lewis told of 
the suffering and danger of the idol of the 
house. 


238 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


Into how many homes she had brought 
the light and strength of her presence in the 
last year it would take long to tell. How 
many heartsick and weary mothers had 
seemed to lay all their burden on her strong 
young shoulders ; and to all, men, women, and 
children, she had given the best of her head 
and her heart, to cure, and to comfort where 
she might not cure. She had won the trust 
and the confidence of the physicians to a 
degree almost unparalleled for one so young, 
so that to name her in the sick-room was 
to inspire courage. There had been houi’s 
when single-handed she had fought with the 
angel of death in the lone watches of the 
night, and welcomed the angel of birth in 
the stillness of the morning ; but it had not 
yet been her fate to hold within her young 
hands the scales of life and death for 
one she held so dear as ^Yolcott Prince. 
Was it strange that for one moment she 
involuntarily felt for the beat of her pulse. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


239 


as she left the carriage, lest it waver in its 
steadiness, and imperil the life of the boy 
who was as dear to her as her own blood 
ties. 

Strong and true it beat, and firm but 
tender was the hand that met the trembling 
touch of the mother on the threshold of the 
sick-room. It took but one experienced 
glance for Nan to discover that Wolcott was 
very ill, and with the calm, decisive tone of 
the trained nurse, she asked for the latest 
directions left by the doctor, and, rapidly 
computing the probable changes since his 
last visit, said almost imperatively to Lewis : 

Take the carriage at once, and tell Dr. 
Harper I must see him. If he is out, find 
Marshall. I must have new directions.” 

Without asking questions, but with set 
lips and clenched hands, Mrs. Prince paced 
up and down in the room, while Nan moved 
about the sick-bed, taking Wolcott’s temper- 
ature and making rapid notes, then called 


240 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


for hot cloths, and other immediate necessi- 
ties with the tone of one who expected 
instant obedienccj. And maids and men- 
servants flew to obey her as though com- 
manded by a sovereign, all feeling that if 
any one could save the pet of the house, 
it was Nan. 

Then Lewis returned, but with Marshall, 
Dr. Harper having been called away. 

Between these two there was free-ma- 
sonry. Each understood without speech, and 
as Nan indicated the conditions rapidly, 
Marshall as quickly noted what changes 
should be made in medicine and treatment. 
The senior doctor had kept him instructed 
upon the case, so that he knew what and 
when such changes might be expected. 

I think I will stay to-night. You 
brought no other nurse. Nan ? You may 
need help. Mrs. Prince will, perhaps, like 
to have a doctor at hand.” 

Is he going — going to get well ? ” Mrs. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 241 

Prince asked, placing her two cold hands 
on Marshall’s arm. 

‘‘We hope so, dear Mrs. Prince. You 
know Nan and I will do our best, and Dr. 
Harper will come again at seven. I will 
stay to-night and help Nan.” 

Nan gave him a grateful look, as he sat 
down by the opposite side of the bed and 
kept his fingers on Wolcott’s pulse. 

The boy was hardly conscious of the min- 
istrations of nurse or doctor, and his mother, 
obedient to Nan’s urgent plea that she should 
rest, consented to sleep, if she could. 

Together through the long hours of the 
night Nan and Marshall kept their vigil, 
never resting in their quest for relief and 
remedy for the sick boy. 

Twice and even three times Marshall 
might have given it up as beyond hope, had 
not Nan’s face, tense with desperate deter- 
mination to use “ human means as though 

they were divine,” and divine as though they 
16 


242 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


were human, spurred him to try once more 
what might seem unavailing. 

And it was as the sun broke in upon the 
east, that Nan, holding the little fellow’s 
hand, said, — 

Oh, Marshall, he is better. His pulse is 
stronger ; and, look ! he opens his eyes and 
knows me.” 

^^And now we must work. Nan,” said 
Marshall. 

And work they did, till the sun was high 
in the heavens and the senior doctor came, 
to pronounce Wolcott out of danger, and 
then to add, — 

I had no idea he would live through the 
night ; to you two he owes his life.” 

Not a mouthful of food had passed Nan’s 
lips since she left the hospital at three, the 
day before, and she had had no rest ; but 
no one could induce her to leave Wolcott 
that day, though, upon Marshall’s promise to 
stay the following night and call her if 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


243 


needed, she consented to rest cand sleep as the 
evening came on, and the boy still held his 
own, gaining a little every hour. 

Lewis, who had paced the hall for hours, 
caught her hand as she came out of the sick- 
room. 

And, Nan, is this your life, what you 
would have it? Nan, you are an angel. No 
wonder you think my life useless.” 

Don’t, Lewis, talk so. I ’m not an angel. 
It is seldom like this, and my love for Wol- 
cott has, of course, made it an awful ex- 
perience.” 

Thank Heaven it ’s over, and he will get 
well. Poor mother is prostrated, and Jill is 
crying her eyes out down stairs. Could n’t 
you let her come up to your room a 
minute ?” 

Not just now, Lewis. I must be alone 
awhile, I am so tired,” said Nan, with white 
lips, entering the room which had always 
been set apart for her, and throwing herself 


244 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


on her knees beside the little white bed where 
she had slept so many happy nights in careless 
girlhood. 

If the prayer was an inarticulate one, it 
was from a heart full of gratitude to Him 
who had given her the victory ; but there 
was mingled with it a cry for strength and 
help in hours of such peril and danger, for it 
* was not the first time Nan had realized the 
serious nature of her chosen calling, and the 
terrible responsibilities which might be hers. 

Long after she slept, down stairs Lewis and 
Jill sat side by side and talked in broken 
whispers, for Lewis and Jill had been en- 
gaged a year. There had been rumors that 
Lewis had taken it for granted that Nan 
would marry him, not knowing how he 
could steer his light craft without her ; but 
when one summer day he had found that 
Nan did not agree to that, but that she 
thought he would do much better to try his 
suit with Jill, he had followed, as usual, 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


245 


Nan’s advice, and found that young lady both 
charming and willing; so just before Lewis 
sailed away for a year among the artists in 
Paris, Jill had promised to marry him by 
and by, and now that he had come back 
the by and by was not too far off. 

As Jill still adored Nan most fondly, she 
had not a spark of jealousy in her heart for 
Lewis’s admiration for her, but quite agreed 
with Lewis that he was not half good enough 
for her ; that she herself, with her pert and 
saucy ways, her fitful temper and ready wit, 
was a much more suitable choice for him. 

I can’t imagine Nan in a Paris cafe ! 
Dear girl ! I hope she won’t waste all her 
health and beauty on sick people,” said Jill. 

I don’t see why she can’t make up her 
mind to marry Marshall. We all know he 
worships the ground she walks on,” said 
Lewis ; then adding, I think she is begin- 
ning to care for him. She seemed so glad 
to see him last night.” 


246 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


I am sure they would be perfectly happy 
among the invalids at the Colony, if they 
were married. I think she has had career 
enough,” said Jill. 

I am glad she did n’t close it before she 
saved Wolcott’s life. Poor mamma, who has 
suffered so much ! ” said Lewis, going for- 
ward to put his arm about his mother, who 
entered the library, pale and weary, with the 
question on her lips, Where is Nan ? ” as 
she sank into a chair. 

Gone to sleep,” Lewis answered, his arm 
still thrown protectingly about her. She 
has not closed her eyes for forty-eight hours, 
and now that Wolcott is so much better 
Marshall says she must rest; and Marshall 
is the only one Nan will obey at times,” he 
added. 

I hope she may sleep, dear child ! Mar- 
shall is so good to take her place, for Nan 
does n’t want another nurse just now. Dear 
girl ! what a life of heroism and self-sacrifice ! 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


247 


Jill, dear, will you give me that photograph 
of Wolcott ? Is n’t it pretty ? ” and, holding 
the treasured likeness of her boy in health 
fondly in her hands, she closed her eyes to 
see the wan little face on the pillow up stairs, 
with a thankful heart that the dear eyes were 
not closed forever. 

What happy days those June days were, 
when Wolcott was convalescent, and Nan 
still lingered, happy to stay beside the dear 
boy who had so nearly slipped from their 
grasp ! Lewis and Jill busy and enthusiastic 
in their plans for the future, artists’ dreams 
of sketching-tours in France and a winter 
in Rome, spending hours together in the 
sick-room or studio, where Lewis was finish- 
ing a splendid study of Giovanni, now a 
prosperous proprietor of a fruit-store, but 
always a devoted retainer of the family, 
keeping Wolcott’s table filled with finest 
grapes and sweetest oranges, and posing 
proudly for the picture which daily increased 


248 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


his vanity. Marshall, coming daily as the 
physician, and yet lingering for some mo- 
ments to chat with them all, and once in a 
while stealing Nan from Wolcott for a walk 
or a drive, at last had led her beyond the East- 
ern Boulevard to the pleasant paths of the 
Park, where birds and trees spoke to them 
both of their happy hunting-grounds. It was 
there Marshall in his frank, manly way 
pleaded for himself for the last time, — 

I have been so patient. Nan ! You 
wanted to try your wings, to fight the fight 
single-handed. Do you think it is easy for 
me to see you passing through such scenes 
as these we have known, alone or at all ? 
You can be as useful, as helpful to mankind, 
as a doctor’s wife. I need you as much as 
the world does. Come, dear, there are 
many nurses, but only one Nan for me. Say 
you will. Nan.” 

“ If I may take care of Wolcott if he 
is ever so ill again. It is all the way I can 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


249 


• repay Mrs. Prince for all she has done for 
me.” 

I promise yon that, and as much more 
home ministration as you like, dear, with the 
lodge at Chicopee full of invalids in summer- 
time ; but together, you and I.” 

What Nan’s answer was to that, it were 
not fair to say; but three months later a 
letter from Chicopee to Mrs. Prince told a 
story in itself. 

Dearest Lady, — So you are all going abroad, 
dear Mrs. Prince. We hardly thought you would 
let Lewis and Jill go off for two years without 
you, and the change will do Wolcott so much 
good. Of course we are all glad and sad that 
Nan and Marshall are really to go to Vienna 
for this year ; but it will be so helpful to them 
both, and we can still think of you as all together, 
and be as good stewards as we can of the interests 
over here. 

The Colony has never been so successful as 
this year, and Daisy is such a comfort to me, 
with all the little girls, teaching them to sew and 
to sing, — a perfect good fairy. Harold had fifteen 


250 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


boys this summer, and some of them have been * 
able to earn a good deal for themselves, and some 
are ready to go away as good workmen. 

Eob and Paul are to go away to school this 
fall, and dear Mrs. Eatcliffe and the good “ Don ” 
will spend the winter with Marian and Herbert. 
Their children are so pretty, and it was so lovely 
to see them scattering roses at Han’s pretty wed- 
ding, which was exactly like Marian’s, they tell 
me, except that the dear old Bishop who is 
dead married Marian, and Steve, our good Saint 
Stephen, performed the ceremony in the lovely 
chapel under the oaks. Steve is such a fine 
fellow, and works so hard at his mission work 
in town. I often wonder if he will ever be selfish 
enough to look for a wife. He thinks he can do 
better work alone, and there is so much work to 
be done. When I go to Brooklyn this winter, I 
shall much miss seeing you all, but shall love to 
think of your happiness on the other side. Lewis 
and Jill with their paints and brushes, Han and 
Marshall in the great hospitals, and Han enjoying 
the music and taking up her violin again, as 
Marshall says she shall, and you, dear friend, to 
be, as ever, the fairy godmother and guardian angel 
to them all. 


NAN IN THE CITY. 


251 


Marshall says that his father has always meant 
that he should have this year abroad, because he 
gave up his last two years at college in those 
hard times, and nothing could have been more 
fortunate than that you could all go together. 

Our baby — the little “ Princess,” as Harold 
always calls her, because she was named for you 
— sends kisses, Daisy much love, and Harold the 
best of wishes. 

Yours ever, 

Makgaret Eliot Katcliffe. 


THE END. 






Nan at Camp Chicopee; 

OR, 

Nan^s Summer with the Boys. 

By MYRA SAWER HAMLIN. 
lUtJstratcd by Jessie McDermott J6mo. Qoth. $1.25. 



“NAN. ” 


Vivacious from the first page to the last, and sure to be voted a prize by the 
boys and girls. Nan spent a summer with the boys, and their pranks and adven- 
tures are unfolded in a manner showing that the author understands children 
thoroughly, and knows well how to put her efforts in their behalf into an acceptable 
literary form. — Congregationalist. 

A breezy, healthful story of outdoor life, which will be sure to interest both girls 
and boys, is “ Nan at Camp Chicopee; or. Nan’s Summer with the Boys,” by 
Myra Sawyer Hamlin. The book is full of incidents of absorbing nature, — 
humorous, romantic, and exciting. The illustrations, which are of a high class, 
include as a frontispiece a picture of “ Nan,” which is of photographic realism. — 
Worcester Spy. 

The story is one of free, outdoor life, characterized by a deal of fine descriptive 
writing and many bits of local color that invest the whole book with an atmosphere 
which is actually fragrant ; the entire story is as fresh and as clear and as bright as 
if some of the breezes of “Lake Chicopee” had blown straight through it from 
cover to cover, and left their odors of flowery pastures and pine woods and New 
Hampshire air on every page. — Bangor Commercial. 


At all Bookstores., or mailed, postpaid, on receipt of price. 

ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON. 


A CAPE MAY DIAMOND. 

By Evelyn Raymond, author of “The Little Lady of the Horse,” “The 
Little Red Schoolhouse,” and “ The Mushroom Cave.” Illustrated by 
Lilian Crawford True. Square lamo. Cloth. Price, $i.$o. 



A CAPE MAY DIAMOND. 

One of the most delightful stories for young readers that have been pub- 
lished for many years was the book given to them two years ago, entitled 
“ The Little Lady of the Horse,” written by Evelyn Raymond. It has already 
become a classic. But the same gifted author has well matched this favorite 
story with a new one which she has produced for the present holiday season, 
entitled “A Cape May Diamond.” The heroine of this story was cast upon 
the beach at Cape May in a basket, made waterproof, when little more than an 
infant, and was adopted by a worthy German and his wife. She was called a 
Diamond by the life-saving men because she was found in the sand, and she 
grew to girlhood a universal favorite on the beach, because of her splendid 
character. She was healthy, true as steel, ready to help anybody in need, and 
as brave as the most faithful dog. Every reader is sure to love the sunny- 
hearted little Karen, and will rejoice in the happy solution of the mystery 
that surrounded her parentage anti her advent at Cajie May. The book is 
finely illustrated by Lilian Crawford True, and it will be sure to be a holiday 
favorite. 


So/c/ by all booksellers. Mailed., postpaid, by the Publishers, 

ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston. 



iHrs. We02iel|)oeft’s Stories. 




Jerry the Blunderer. By lily f. wesselhoeft, 

author of “Sparrow the Tramp,” “Flipwing the Spy,” “Old 
Rough the Miser,” etc. l6mo. Cloth. Illustrated from 
photographs taken from life. Price, $1.25. 


Sold by all Booksellers. Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of price, 
by the Pvblishers, 

ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston, Mass. 



Messrs, Roberts Brothers' Publications. 


THE MUSHROOM CAVE. 



By Evelyn Raymond, author of The Little Lady of the Horse.^ 
With illustrations by Victor A, Searles, Square 12mo* 
Qoth. Price, $J.50, 




IS very artistically illustrated by Victor A. Searles, and is 
handsomely printed and bound. The chief characters are 
members of a Quaker family. The young hero and hero- 
ine, through misfortune, sho^ a readiness to make the best 
of things, he by diligent application, and she by meeting 
everything with a happy disposition, which is both enter- 
taining and must encourage other youngsters who read their 
adventures to earnest deeds. There are many exciting in- 
cidents and surprises in the story, which is told with exceed- 
ing grace and brightness. It should be a very popular 
Christmas gift book. — Boston Times. 

It tells of the successful scheme of two bright children 
to raise mushrooms, and of the way they finally lifted the 
cloud of debt that rested on their home. The story is full 
of good moral lessons, imparted in such a way that they do not hurt the 
interest. The book is finely illustrated. — San Francisco Chronicle. 


Mailed, postpaid, cm receipt of price, hj> the publishers, 

ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston. 











